


Throw It All Without Fear

by aerClassic



Series: At Your Service [2]
Category: ATEEZ (Band)
Genre: Flight Attendant!Hongjoong and CEO!Yunho's continuing adventures in love and life, M/M, They're Still Nasty, trust fall exercises thinly veiled as relationship milestones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-18
Updated: 2019-07-18
Packaged: 2020-06-26 10:47:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 26,483
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19766605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aerClassic/pseuds/aerClassic
Summary: I love you not only for what you are, but for what I am when I am with you. I love you notonly for what you have made of yourself, but for what you are making of me.Not all landings are smooth; sometimes turbulence is needed to truly appreciate the wheels touching ground.





	Throw It All Without Fear

**Author's Note:**

> tw: panic attacks, attempted blackmail, and brief mentions of a shitty boyfriend

Hongjoong will be embarrassed later when he realizes just how long the two of them stood outside his apartment door grinning goofily at each other while trailing tears and snot onto the (somewhat less glitzy than Yunho’s highrise) flooring. Especially so when he finds out his neighbor three doors away had poked her head out to yell at them just as the ring came into view, and the overly excited squealing the next time they meet each other in the elevator will give Hongjoong a migraine for a _month_. 

Later.

For now, he only closes the lid of the velvet box gently and tugs at Yunho’s coat sleeve, entertained by Yunho’s face turning into a confused mask — a veritable question mark from his eyebrows down to his chin.

“Come in, I’m not doing this is the hallway,” Hongjoong tries to smile reassuringly, _does_ end up smiling like a moron when Yunho shifts his arm to lace their fingers together tight in a vice grip. They’re both still shaking, nerves jittering hard enough that Hongjoong nearly trips over _literally nothing_ on their way to sit on his plush sofa.

“Hyung, you didn’t really give me an answer,” Yunho pouts at him as he tugs Hongjoong down to sit in his lap, arms wrapped tight around Hongjoong’s middle like he’s trying to make sure Hongjoong has no way to escape. Not that Hongjoong is going to try. 

Hongjoong lets himself be clutched tight, curled into Yunho’s chest where he feels small and warm and infinitely precious. “I’m pretty sure you didn’t ask me a question, sir.”

Yunho hasn’t, not really, because just handing over a box with a pretty ring inside has any number of implications with their history and Hongjoong refuses to make assumptions based solely on the heat of the moment. 

It’s either a gift or a—

Or—

Hell.

Yunho squirms uncomfortably beneath him, hiding his embarrassed face against Hongjoong’s chest so his answer comes out muffled. 

Hongjoong breathes deep.

The box is a heavy weight in his palm. Hongjoong imagines they’re teetering on the edge of a cliff with the threat of a landslide and a stiff wind clawing at their backs. There’s a dangerous part of him whispering to take this and run, to accept the proposal and damn the consequences. This would be the perfect opportunity to finally dig his claws into the largest bank account this side of Korea — this side of the _hemisphere_ — and the thrill of it alone should have Hongjoong dropping to his knees in eager acceptance.

Hongjoong exhales. 

Somewhere in the dark recesses of his mind Hongjoong’s younger self is screaming bloody murder.

“To answer your question,” He slides the box back into Yunho’s pocket while pressing a tender kiss to the edge of his ear. “I’m saying no.” Yunho tenses hard and Hongjoong revels in the biting sting of nails digging into the flesh above his hips. Quick, before Yunho can dump him and run, he adds, “But only for now.”

Yunho’s voice is a devastating watery rasp when he whispers, “Just for now?”

“Just for now,” Hongjoong agrees — somehow calm despite the shaking that his body refuses to cease. He leans away just enough to grab a handful of tissues from his coffee table so he can wipe both their noses to make this interaction less disgusting than it’s already going to be. Yunho blows when prompted and Hongjoong, at least, takes a moment to appreciate the single most grossly domestic thing he’s ever done in his life, excluding the sickly plane ride from the JFK airport. “If we’re going to do this right, we need to set up some ground rules this go around.”

Yunho still has his face buried in Hongjoong’s chest when he sighs, “Fine, whatever you want.”

“Yunho,” Hongjoong grabs Yunho’s chin to jerk his face upward and hisses, “Whatever I want could be all that you have.”

For his part, Yunho only gazes back at him with a calm expression. “It would all be yours anyway if you said ‘yes’ to begin with, dumbass.”

Hongjoong sucks in a tight breath. It feels strange to know how much he’s potentially giving up by trying to do this right. “I meant, I could take you for all you’re worth and _leave_.”

Hongjoong wants to hate the smug upturn of Yunho’s mouth when he grabs his hand to place a wet kiss to the middle knuckle, but it’s mostly a turn on and his body is a traitorous horndog on a good day. “But you wouldn’t, hyung. You love me.”

Hongjoong can’t see himself, but whatever his face does at that moment must be hilarious since Yunho starts cackling until tears bead at the corners of his eyes. “That’s—that’s not—Do you have any sense of self-preservation?” Yunho continues to snicker while Hongjoong glares back at him until he finally snatches his hand away.

“Hongjoong,” Yunho grins at him. “I love you. I’ve loved you for a _while_. If handing you the reins to my fortune or my company is what makes you stay, I’d do it without a second thought.”

“That’s stupid,” Hongjoong pales. No one has ever implied they’d give up their power for him, ever. Not even Yeosang or Seonghwa—and that’s saying something. “ _You’re_ stupid." 

“Stupid in love maybe,” Yunho coos back. His palms are warm when they run up the length of Hongjoong’s back over the ratty shirt he’d put on yesterday—or was it the day before? Time had lost all meaning when he thought Yunho had decided to leave him in the dust. “Hyung, come on, what are your conditions?” 

“Fine,” Hongjoong closes his eyes so he doesn’t have to see Yunho’s reaction. “Number one, I don’t want to be your dirty little secret you pay under the table anymore.”

Yunho’s hands stop their slow up and down to pause at the base of Hongjoong’s spine where his sweatpants rest against his waist. He’s not even wearing anything name brand; it makes Hongjoong feel exposed and weak without his usual barrier of luxury fashion. “Uh,” Hongjoong squeezes his eyes closed tighter in anticipation of the rejection. “Already done, but I can make it more obvious if you really want.”

Hongjoong snaps his head up so fast he almost gives himself whiplash and the rush of relief makes him so dizzy the room spins. “What? What do you mean, ‘already done’?”

“I—hyung, I took you to multiple work functions. Pretty much everyone I interact with on a daily basis knows who you are. They’re aware. You have never once been a _secret_.” Yunho’s cheeks pink adorably as he bites the edge of his bottom lip. _His lips are chapped_ , Hongjoong thinks crazily, _his lips are chapped and everyone knows my name_. “Even my bodyguard has to tell me to stop talking about you all the time.”

“Your—,” That’s not right. Why would Yunho, the shy person that he really is deep down, freely talk about his sexcapades to near strangers? “Wait, what do you call me? Like what do you describe me as to these people you talk to everyday.”

Yunho’s cheeks turn a darker shade that starts to travel over the bridge of his nose and down the long slope of his neck. “Um.”

“Yunho.”

“Hyung, promise me you won’t get mad,” Yunho whines at him. Any other time Hongjoong would reward him with a kiss or some small token of affection, but instead he pinches one crimson cheek between two fingers.

“What are you calling me, Yunho.” It’s not a question.

Yunho’s breath comes out so fast Hongjoong imagines he can hear his lungs deflate. “My partner.”

The apartment goes silent. Hongjoong blinks, nerveless fingers suddenly slack enough that Yunho can shake off his pinched cheek and work the pain out with exaggerated jaw bobbing. “Your partner.”

“Yes.”

Hongjoong feels his neck go hot. His ears pop. Somewhere outside is the shrill scream of an ambulance siren careening down the highway at speed. “Not your business partner.”

Yunho rubs shy circles against Hongjoong’s sweatpant covered kneecaps, and stutters, “N-no.”

When he was younger and more naive, Hongjoong thought the first upperclassman that showed him even a modicum of interest was going to be The One. He thought that man would be the person he’d get to hold hands and lock elbows with in front of the world; the person who kissed him in public just because he loved Hongjoong so much and couldn’t possibly wait until they were behind closed doors to show him; the person who boasted about his boyfriend to anyone and everyone he met.

Hongjoong had been wrong. 

Their relationship lasted six months wherein Hongjoong was not allowed to acknowledge his existence or even _think_ of holding his hand — any outward signs of being a couple would be mocked or ignored or, worse, denied outright to Hongjoong’s face. Even the guy’s friends thought Hongjoong was just some weird hangers-on obsessed with the older crowd. 

“Why can’t I say you’re my boyfriend?” Hongjoong had asked back then, in the muggy air of an ugly sedan, staring resolutely out the front window while Han Jaejin worked him open with his thick fingers—they were parked in the middle of a crop of trees at the edge of town known for high school hookups. Secluded. 

“Because,” Jaejin groaned, clearly exasperated with the question, “if anyone found out, they’d laugh at me,” he’d licked a stripe up the column of Hongjoong’s throat to suck a mark against his adams apple. He always made a point to mark Hongjoong up in places that couldn’t be hidden, almost like a display of possession even as he denied their involvement. “Why does anyone need to know?”

“Because I like you,” Hongjoong hiccuped at the first press of Jaejin’s cockhead nudging against his still too tight opening, “I want to be able to hold your hand and tell everyone we’re dating.”

“Hongjoong,” Jaejin had pushed forward too fast and too eager while Hongjoong hissed from the burn and clawed at the shitty leather seating. “You tell anyone what we’re doing and I will deny it. How would that make you look, hm? Let’s just enjoy ourselves.” He’d fisted Hongjoong’s wilting erection with a palm that was too dry. “Keep your mouth shut and I’ll buy you dinner, baby.”

That had been month five. At the tail end of month six, Hongjoong was tired of hiding and confronted Jaejin in the middle of their school hallway. “Tell them.”

Jaejin barely looked at him while his friends traded sly looks and giggles behind their fists. “Sorry, dude, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Hongjoong had clamped his fist so tight his nails bit into the skin and blood had welled hot against his fingertips. He remembers the drop of red that had stained the linoleum flooring for three weeks before the school finally had them cleaned. “Tell them we’re dating.”

Jaejin’s friends burst into laughter almost simultaneously. One had stepped forward to grab Jaejin’s shoulder, “Bro, where the fuck did you find this kid? Yah,” the friend had kicked a foot into Hongjoong’s stomach. “Show some respect, brat. This guy here’s been dating Kim Aeyoung for two years, what the fuck is your damage?”

The ensuing fight—which wasn’t a fair one at all considering it was three against one while Jaejin looked on, impassive—left Hongjoong with bruised ribs, a split lip, and a concussion. None of them compared to the all encompassing hurt that speared his chest open, a gaping wound that felt as if it would never close—a yawning chasm filled half-way with anger and distaste. He’d vowed that day, while Jaejin watched him bleed, to never give himself or his heart over to anyone again. He would never allow another Han Jaejin the satisfaction of seeing him cry, so he’d concealed his heart under as many locks as he could imagine and buried them down in his deep dark trenches where no one could hurt it again.

Except—

Yunho is here. Yunho is here and is not—maybe had never been—ashamed of his pseudo-relationship with Hongjoong. He’s told multiple people about Hongjoong specifically just because he could, because he had no reason to hide. 

Because he’s proud to say Hongjoong is _his_ and no one else’s.

Like he’d hold Hongjoong’s hand or lock their elbows walking down the center path of a high school hallway.

Jeong Yunho, billionaire CEO and by rights someone who shouldn’t even look at Hongjoong twice, was the complete antithesis of Han Jaejin.

The withered shape of Hongjoong’s heart fills and starts beating double-time for the first time in years. Disgustingly, his nose decides to start running as tears once again blur across his vision. Before his chin crumples from the onslaught of too much emotion all at once, Hongjoong manages to choke out, “Yunho, I—”

Yunho quiets him with gentle shushing, tugging Hongjoong’s head down to rest against his neck and butting up against Yunho’s chin. “I know, hyung.” 

Hongjoong wants to say, ‘No, you really don’t understand’ or ‘This is too much, you’re too much, I’m going to _ruin_ you’ or ‘I love you, I love you, I love you’ but all that comes from his mouth is a sad pathetic hiccup followed by a cascade of tears that have probably been long overdue. Yunho, perfect man that he is, only rocks them together until Hongjoong can finally regulate his breathing and hands Hongjoong more tissues to clean the absolute wreck of his face. 

Yunho’s voice is barely above a whisper when he asks, “Feel any better?”

“No,” Hongjoong answers in a nasal tone, because he doesn’t. He just feels gross and sticky and his head hurts from the sudden hysterics. Worse, now his contacts are cloudy. “I hate crying.”

Yunho laughs. Hongjoong can’t see his face, still tucked under the safety of Yunho’s chin, but the sound of his laughter makes Hongjoong smile back all the same. “Come on, hyung, let’s go take a bath and you can tell me the rest of your conditions.”

Right. Conditions. For dating with the intention of—of _[redacted]_. Hongjoong can’t even think of the word without panic at the prospect of commitment turning his mind to buzzing white noise. “Okay.”

Hongjoong will never get over the displays of strength when Yunho decides to put his muscles to use, lifting Hongjoong in one fluid motion to carry him to the bathroom and sets him down on the lip on the tub while they wait for the water to fill. It’s smaller than the one at Yunho’s penthouse, and, for the first time in his life, Hongjoong feels self conscious about the disparity between their living spaces. There’s no Gucci towels or Versace curtains or glamourous claw footed fixtures; nothing to suggest Hongjoong could pull his own weight in a relationship with someone so far above his social bracket.

It’s only when Yunho has him arranged in his lap again, head tilted back so Yunho can drip water and shampoo onto Hongjoong’s no doubt greasy unwashed hair, that he finally asks, “So condition number one is already checked off the list. What else do you want from me?”

Hongjoong closes his eyes and slides his fingers through Yunho’s toes beneath the water just to feel him jerk from the ticklish sensation. “I didn’t think I’d get that far, honestly.”

“Hongjoong,” Yunho tugs him impossibly close. “Has anyone ever told you you’re really stupid sometimes?”

“Yah!” Hongjoong viciously digs his fingers to Yunho’s feet in retaliation. “Rude!”

“It’s true, though!” Yunho giggles into his neck. “Why would I want to hide you when I was literally about to ask you to marry me?” 

Hongjoong glares at the distorted image of their legs beneath the moving water. “I don’t know. Maybe you just wanted a trophy husband you could trot out every few years so everyone knows I’m happy, healthy, and alive. Plus the fact that I’ve never really, I mean, _we’ve_ never—” Hongjoong breaks off on a moan, Yunho’s fingers rubbing tantalizing circles around the barbells in both nipples. 

“Get to the point, hyung.”

“I’ve never met anyone you’re close with,” Hongjoong gasps, distracted by the sharp stings of pleasure racing down his spine to pool urgently in his groin. “I don’t even know who your friends are or who the bodyguard you mentioned is, so I thought—” 

“You thought wrong,” Yunho husks dangerously low in his ear, “There’s just never been a good opportunity to introduce you with how your schedule works.”

“Mh,” Hongjoong rolls his hips back to feel the slowly filling line of Yunho’s cock against his ass. “Condition two, introduce me to your friends.”

“Done.” Yunho sucks a mean mark against the angry vein in his neck. Almost like Han Jaejin so long ago, but at least _now_ Hongjoong has the reassurance Yunho won’t deny his involvement. “Anything else?”

“I-if I,” Hongjoong covers his mouth against another cracked moan when one of Yunho’s beautiful soft palms rubs over the skin of his stomach and down to his groin, just shy of his hardening dick. “If I think of something, I’ll be sure to let you know.”

“Good,” Fingers travel further downward until Hongjoong feels them roll his balls gently with a squeeze. Hongjoong breathes hard and humid through his mouth. “On that note, I have some conditions of my own.”

Even muted by the water, Yunho’s hand feels more than a tease when he rubs three fingers tantalizingly soft up Hongjoong’s shaft to tap the metal embedded in the skin. “Such as?”

“One, you have to put that key I gave you to use,” Hongjoong lets Yunho tilt his head enough that he can press a slick kiss to Hongjoong’s gaping mouth. “I want to see you more than once a week, I feel deprived.”

Yunho punctuates the statement with teeth scraping over the curve of his ear. Hongjoong can barely think through the fog of arousal. “Alright, I can—I can do that.”

“Two,” Yunho’s other hand works its way between their bodies to rub firmly against his hole and Hongjoong clenches his teeth to keep from choking. “I want you to keep and wear the ring.”

“But—” Hongjoong breaks off to curse as the finger against his opening slips in to the first knuckle, digging his nails into Yunho’s legs when he feels the smug huff of breath against his nape.

“It doesn’t have to mean anything, hyung,” Yunho fucks his hand up slow, slow, “I just want to see you wear it.”

“Compromise,” Hongjoong pants while his hands shake against Yunho’s knobby knees. “I’ll wear it on a chain until I accept your proposal. Fair?”

“Fair,” Yunho agrees. “And third,” the hand previously teasing Hongjoong’s dick goes tight, almost too tight, and moves in tandem with the, now two, fingers in his ass. Realistically, Hongjoong knows this is some ploy to get him too worked up to refuse whatever is about to come out of Yunho’s mouth, but fuck if it isn’t working. Heat coils tight in his groin, already the edge of his orgasm is close enough he imagines he can see it rolling towards him—a tidal wave on the horizon crashing forward to sweep him out to sea. “Third, I want you to consider quitting your job at the airline.”

“Wh-what would I—,” Hongjoong sobs when the first almost crash of the waves lick towards him, “Yunho, I can’t—”

“Trust me, Hongjoong,” his voice sounds so calm and reasonable, “Whatever you _really_ want to do, I’ll support you.”

Hongjoong wants to be angry; he wants to ask Yunho how _dare_ he make assumptions about Hongjoong’s career goals, but between the sweet barely-here-and-gone kiss to his mouth, the tight grip around his cock, and the fingers pressing dead center on his prostate, Hongjoong can only inhale one wounded breath and comes harder than he ever has in his _life_ , feeling as if he’s been sucked out to sea to drown. 

Not long after, Yunho hustles him out of the dirty water in the tub and Hongjoong drops gratefully to his knees—despite Yunho’s protests—to suck him down and swallow against the sharp tang of skin until Yunho comes down his throat. Hongjoong knows he doesn’t have to put in work for anything between them now, but he loves the reciprocity they’ve built into this half-relationship. How Yunho can have him mewling helplessly while he jerks Hongjoong off and then turn around to be bent double while Hongjoong fucks into him until Yunho is crying and coming totally untouched. 

It’s only when they’re huddled close in his bed that Hongjoong finally has the nerve to ask, “Yunho, when did you,” Hongjoong stumbles when Yunho props his chin on his chest, expression curious and open. “When did you start...actually liking me?”

Hongjoong feels like an idiot for the elementary-esque question, but Yunho only hums in consideration, eyes going distant while his lips curve upwards. “Did I ever tell you the story about the first time we met?”

“Uh,” Hongjoong blinks down at him, confused. “You shouldn’t need to because I was there?”

Yunho, bizarrely, starts giggling into his chest. “No, I mean, did I ever tell you how stupid I was the first time I saw you? You gave me the worst boner of my life that day.”

“I helped get rid of that boner,” Yunho’s mirth is apparently contagious because Hongjoong can’t help himself from laughing along with him. “Point to me.”

Yunho rolls away to smother himself with a pillow. “You really didn’t, though,” and starts laughing harder at the sound of outrage Hongjoong can’t seem to hold back. “The _first_ boner, hyung. The second one was all on you, I promise.”

The pillow makes a quiet thump when Hongjoong shoves it out of the way and to the floor as he kicks his legs up and over to rest on either side of Yunho’s hips, delighting in the way Yunho’s eyes flash darker because of his new position. “Tell me.”

**\----------------**

This is his second flight in as many days and Yunho is feeling the bone deep exhaustion from the combination jetlag and sleep deprivation from staying in uncomfortably luxe hotels. He misses the days when he could rest in tiny Bed and Breakfasts with their soft beds and homey interiors, instead of the ritzy tryhard hotels the company books for him now. As much as he appreciates his somewhat newly acquired financial freedom, Yunho is ready to stop moving for _at least_ a week.

The terminal is easy enough to find and Yunho flops bonelessly into the gate seating with his briefcase and the latest newspaper thrown haphazardly in his lap. He knows he has to keep up some appearance of aloofness so no one decides to get chatty—god knows how many times Jongho had drilled into his head that the wealthy head of a company should maintain an air of superiority, if for nothing else than his own safety. The less approachable he appeared, the less chance of someone figuring out his identity and making a grab for his wallet or his passport. Flipping open to the business section of the newspaper, Yunho supposes attempting to sleep with his eyes open will have to suffice.

Over the intercom, a man’s silk-smooth voice announces, “Flight KE906, Incheon to Narita International, now boarding First Class Passengers. Please have your tickets ready at the gate, thank you.”

Yunho sighs. So much for trying to master the art of open-eyed sleeping. He’s just about to stand up when Yunho finally glances at the flight attendant stand and nearly swallows his tongue on a deep inhale. There’s a male attendant standing at the gate entrance, smiling mouth a pearly pink and hair dyed a bright crimson, who is so fucking beautiful Yunho completely misses his cue to board. He’s speaking to someone—that wannabe high class suckup with the fake Rolex Yunho had the immense displeasure of speaking with at the security check in—and Yunho spies a flash of metal in his mouth. 

A tongue ring. 

Yunho has to subtly shift the newspaper in his lap because now he has _the worst_ boner twitching against the seam of his slacks.

Fuck.

Shit.

How is he supposed to board now? The guy is going to _notice_ and then Yunho will _die_ of embarrassment.

**\----------------**

“‘Fucking beautiful’, huh?” Hongjoong husks, shifting his ass against the tent in Yunho’s underwear while Yunho grabs his hips to stop their movement. He’s still stretched from being fingered in the bathtub, Hongjoong thinks he could probably shift their underwear to the side and take Yunho without much prep; without much of anything, really, because the hazy burn of being speared open too quick makes something in his chest ache with want.

“You know you are, hyung,” Yunho groans up at him. His cheeks are the color of ripe apples, red spreading to cover the tips of his ears and down until the brown of his nipples. Hongjoong's breath hitches hard when Yunho shifts his hips upwards, the drag of dick against his still clothed hole so good it takes all of Hongjoong’s restraint not to take him in immediately.

“I know, but it sounds so much better when _you_ say it.”

Yunho moans loud when Hongjoong teases the edges of one nipple with two fingers. “Hyung, let me finish my story! I was trying to make a point.”

“Sorry,” Hongjoong laughs. He places a grinning kiss to Yunho’s wet mouth before going back to concentrating on the tortuously slow grind of his hips. “Finish before I do and you can fuck me.”

**\----------------**

It takes all of first class and coach to board before Yunho’s erection finally calms down enough that he thinks he can handle walking by the attendant’s station without making an absolute ass out of himself. Grabbing his briefcase, Yunho steels himself and decides to play it cool by walking by the stand without stopping—only pauses long enough to flash his ticket and hope to god they don’t call him out on missing first call. 

Fortunately, Yunho doesn’t trip over his own feet on the walk down the receiving ramp and gives himself a metaphorical pat on the back.

Unfortunately for him, Beautiful Redhead seems to have something going on with the woman in the short skirt and the tight bun. He can see beyond the curtain that covers the attendant’s area as the man adjusts the line of her jacket and the edge of her skirt, lips pursing against the woman’s ear on a kiss. Yunho was kind of hoping to make some moves, but now he knows his chances are essentially nonexistent and it sucks.

Yunho hides his pout by distracting himself with trying to decide which angsty playlist to listen to on his airpods. Not even an hour into the flight, the stewardess from before pretends to trip but Yunho ignores her. He’s seen the trick before, when he made the mistake of wearing an obvious Givenchy tailored suit and three different women ‘tripped’ over their own shoes in front of him in a poor attempt at flashing their asses in his face. 

And what exactly is she trying to pull when Hot Redhead is right there? 

When he is right there being the hottest person Yunho has seen in his life? 

Even the guy’s nose is pretty, there is no justice in the world.

**\----------------**

“Did you seriously wax poetic about my _nose_?” Hongjoong covers his mouth to keep his laughter in check while also peeling back Yunho’s underwear over the hard jut of his cock. “That’s so cute, babe.”

“Shut up,” Yunho pants back at him, hands held above his head to grip at Hongjoong’s headboard. Hongjoong grins and places a kiss to the center of his chest as a reward. “Stop interrupting my story.”

“Okay, okay,” Hongjoong smiles wide, saccharine sweet. “Tell me more about how hot I am.”

“Narcissist.”

“Mmm,” Hongjoong agrees. He sits back on his heels to admire the sweaty line of Yunho’s chest and the tantalizing bead of precum dotting the tip of his cock. His mouth waters when Yunho’s dick twitches and another bead wells up to roll down the length against the criss-cross of veins. “Continue.”

**\----------------**

His internal pouting lasts until, for some reason Yunho can’t fathom, hot attendant knocks against his seat and manages to dislodge one of Yunho’s airpods enough that it falls out and rolls underfoot. 

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” is whispered in a low tone against his ear. Yunho’s skin immediately erupts with goosebumps. “Here you are, sir.” 

Internal panic aside, Yunho attempts to keep his calm and collected facade with a frown. He barely manages to answer, “Whatever, it’s fine,” when their hands touch as he takes his missing airpod back. 

That should be the end of it. Yunho will continue on his sad lonely bachelor journey to Japan while the attendant continues to make googoo eyes at whatsherface with the nice hair, and they’ll miss each other like two ships in the night—never to see or touch or interact. Except now there’s a hand on Yunho’s shoulder.

“Would you like a hot towel, _sir_?” Yunho can’t breathe through the panic of having someone so attractive disrupting his personal bubble, can only shake his head in refusal. Hot Redhead makes a low tutting sound and leans further down until his hand shifts from the edge of Yunho’s shoulder to almost touching the inseam of his slacks. “ If there’s _anything_ I can do, _please_ don’t hesitate to ask.”

Oh. 

Oh fuck, that was a come on.

Yunho coughs in order to cover the mortifying squeak attempting to climb out of his mouth. “That, uh, that won’t be necessary, but thank you all the same.”

“Yes, sir,” Hottie With a Body leans even closer until Yunho imagines he can feel the edges of the man’s mouth against his ear, “But should anything _come up_ , just call for me, mh?”

Yunho’s mouth goes bone dry. Heat surges against his cheeks and his groin. The erection from earlier is about to make its triumphant return so Yunho quickly crosses his legs to conceal himself should the need...arise. Yunho guiltily watches the sway of the guy’s hips as he walks away back behind the curtain. The guilt lasts as long as it takes for Yunho to overhear the woman excitedly whispering something and the low baritone of Red’s answer. Yunho manages to catch the tail end—”...flights to get his dick down my throat”—and—

Yunho, apparently, has a very real, very non-zero chance at getting his attention.

That’s the last time they interact since someone sitting in coach takes up a large portion of Red’s time. His facial expression is increasingly thunderous the longer Yunho watches him pace back from the split between the two seating options. Even when they descend into Narita International, Red is too busy giving intercom directions and bussing carts of trash back to the back for Yunho to grab him and shove his number in Red’s pocket. 

Yunho may not be the smoothest operator when it comes to hookups, but _by god_ he cannot let this chance escape now that he knows the man is interested. At the runway when it’s time to disembark, he decides to throw all caution to the wind and lays his business card—complete with identifiable information and his personal number—smack in the middle of his seat. It’ll be obvious to anyone with half a brain that it was left there deliberately instead of having fallen out of a wallet or his briefcase. 

It’s not as if Yunho has any other options. Pretending to trip and fall on flight attendant dick only worked in porn. 

**\----------------**

Lube drips over Hongjoong’s knuckles as he works himself open with two fingers of one hand while the other jacks Yunho just shy of too fast. “Can I tell you a secret?” he whispers into Yunho’s ear while he gasps desperately for air. 

“Wh-what?” Yunho’s eyes are taking on that glazed quality Hongjoong loves so much. The faraway gaze of someone about to be so lost in pleasure they can’t make words anymore. It’s Hongjoong’s favorite thing to watch.

“Yujin joked about pretending to trip and fall on your dick before you boarded the plane,” Hongjoong snickers when Yunho groans in disgust. “We had a whole system in place if her plan didn’t work.”

“So you—you set out to seduce me from the start,” Yunho’s hips kick up when Hongjoong walks forward on his knees until his hole lines up with Yunho’s prick, just barely letting the angry wet tip rest against it, and Hongjoong can’t help but giggle a little helplessly.

“I mean, you’re not wrong,” Hongjoong holds Yunho’s dick steady and gives himself no time to adjust against the intrusion when he slams his hips down to meet Yunho’s own in a wet slap. His boyfriend—Hongjoong’s _partner_ , christ—cries out, arms twitching as his grip visibly tightens on the headboard edge, knuckles white and veins popping up thick and prominent in his hands and his arms. “How did you find me at the bar that day?”

“Hyung,” Yunho slurs, “Hyung, let me touch you and I’ll tell you.”

“Promise?” Hongjoong asks, clenching and unclenching around Yunho just to be mean. 

“I promise,” Yunho whines back, hips vibrating with the repressed urge to fuck up hard and fast into Hongjoong’s heat. 

“Fine, go ahead,” Yunho’s hands are lightning quick to dig his nails into his hips and Hongjoong has to really keep the amusement in check at how overeager Yunho is appearing. For someone that’s already come once tonight, he’s acting as if it’s the first and only time he’s going to get to orgasm in the near future. Hongjoong groans at the feel of Yunho’s cock rubbing in unrelenting stabs against his walls. “Tell me how you found me.”

“I just—I literally just saw your hair out of the corner of my eye,” Yunho huffs an affected groan. “I couldn’t walk away and—and god, hyung, you’re so beautiful, what was I supposed to do?” Yunho’s pistoning hips start to stutter and Hongjoong can’t wait to take in the impending release, cum staining his insides always makes him feel powerful and wanted like nothing else. “I liked you when I saw you, I liked you when you talked to me, I liked you when you shoved your tongue in my mouth in that awful bathroom stall.” 

“But that doesn’t tell me,” Hongjoong breaks off to cry out against the burn of dick dragging too fast against his rim and the telltale hardening of Yunho’s shaft stretching him further open, “That doesn’t tell me when you liked me for _me_.”

Yunho forces him down to seal their mouths together as he jerks a load into Hongjoong’s hole. It’s hot, it’s so hot and Hongjoong feels like maybe he could come himself if only Yunho would _touch_ him. When they separate, Yunho rasps, “I’ve been trying to tell you I’ve liked you for _you_ from the _start_ , moron.”

Sweet confession or not, Hongjoong is going to lose his mind if Yunho doesn’t touch his dick in the next ten seconds. “Yunho, baby, I love you and this is adorable, but I need—”

Yunho slips out. He doesn’t give Hongjoong time to feel empty, just sits up to fold Hongjoong in half until his knees end up somewhere close to his ears and licks into the needy clenching of his ass—still full with a mixture of Yunho’s own cum and lube. Hongjoong knows that taste, the filthy swirl of fake-tasteless fruit and the bitterness of cum along with the salt of skin, and wails when Yunho delves his tongue on deep licks totally unbothered by it. 

“Yunho—oh my god—Yunho, I’m going to—I’m,” Hongjoong can’t even finish his thought before the urgency pounding in his groin and his ears and his brain finally coalesce into an orgasm that hits him hard enough he doesn’t even care that he’s still bent double and shooting across his own face. His cum leaves hot streaks against his cheeks, his nose, and his mouth before his eyes roll into the back of his head and Hongjoong—blissfully, mercifully—passes out.

**\----------------**

True to his word, the next morning Hongjoong trades a Chanel pendant on a platinum silver chain with the gemstone covered ring and allows Yunho the honor of draping it around his neck. “You sure you don’t want to just wear it on a finger?” Yunho pouts while tracing his own digits over the round edge sitting heavily against Hongjoong’s heart. A lead weight. A near constant reminder of the implied commitment Hongjoong is sort of desperately trying not to let himself think about or he _will_ panic and fuck everything up.

“I told you I’d wear it when I accept your proposal.” Hongjoong kisses Yunho’s knuckles. “And when we cross off some of those conditions we talked about.”

Yunho hums in agreement, shifting his arms up and around Hongjoong’s shoulders to sway them to and fro in a strange facsimile of a waltz. “Which one do you want to start on first?”

Hongjoong pretends to mull the question over. “First,” Yunho shifts back enough to give him the wide-eyed expectant stare more at home on a labrador retriever's face than a man’s. Somewhere in the distance Hongjoong imagines he can hear the echo of the first lock around his heart dropping into clean pieces against his floor. “ _First_ , let’s get some breakfast. I’m starving.”

Yunho’s expression droops instantaneously. “Hyung, that’s not fair.”

“Probably not, but,” Hongjoong breathes hard through his nose and grabs one of Yunho’s hands tight while he still has the nerve. “Yunho, I’m scared.”

Even knowing who Yunho is as a person, Hongjoong expects ridicule. He expects a snide, sarcastic, ‘That’s stupid’ or for Yunho to _laugh_ , because Hongjoong has only ever been in toxic relationships with men and their money where he second guesses every single emotion not related to getting paid. It’s still too early and strange for him to completely believe this whole arrangement isn’t about to come collapsing in on his ears.

The apartment is silent save for the low murmur of morning traffic and the sounds of Seoul waking up. Hongjoong stares blankly at the faded SNU emblem and tries to match his breathing with Yunho’s own. Sweat bubbles up along his top lip.

Yunho finally leans forward to press a gentle closed-mouth kiss to the center of Hongjoong’s forehead. “I’m in the mood for pancakes.”

**\----------------**

Hongjoong had begged for more time off from the airline the morning after he’d assumed Yunho was kicking him to the curb, and then another few days more when Yunho showed up at his door with his tears and his ring. They spend the first afternoon together—really and truly together instead of Hongjoong essentially throwing himself at Yunho’s wallet—cleaning out the neglected takeout boxes and wilted vegetables from Hongjoong’s sad bachelor fridge.

Yunho sniffs one tupperware container and immediately throws the whole thing in the bin while pinching his nose closed against a gag. “Hongjoong, I hate to tell you this but I don’t think anything in here is salvageable. I will buy you new dishes if you let me throw everything away.”

Hongjoong sort of agrees with him. Half of the things in his crisper drawer look as if they’ve gained sentience; he feels a little guilty for spraying the whole thing down with foaming bleach and pictures tiny civilizations crying out and being silenced all at once. “Yeah, alright. Leave the kimchi container in the back alone but everything else can go.”

“Why do you have so much old takeout?” Yunho apparently can’t help his curiosity by opening another colorful box of mystery—it contains the other foil covered half of a personal pan pizza Hongjoong actually bought before the long trek home last week—and grimaces at the mound of withered spinach and mushrooms congealed in old marinara. “Hyung this is a travesty. Clean your refrigerator more often.”

“Listen, not all of us eat fine dining every other night—” Yunho interrupts him with a childish snort, “—shut up, you know what I meant. Anyway, I’m usually too tired whenever I get home from the airline that it’s just easier to order in than try to use energy I don’t have to cook food I’m not going to like anyway.” Hongjoong hipchecks the door closed so he doesn’t have to make eye contact with whatever that orange thing growing penicilin is in the furthest corner. “This is the worst it’s been in months since most of my free time for cleaning gets eaten up by _you_.”

“Hyung-ah, that’s so unhealthy,” Yunho walks up behind him to clasp his hands together around Hongjoong’s waist and prop his chin against his shoulder, totally ignoring Hongjoong’s sort of confession about his time management skills for which he is instantly grateful. Now that Yunho has been given the all clear to be as handsy as he wants, he's upped his needy clinging up to eleven; not that Hongjoong is complaining considering his libido has decided to go into hyperdrive to compensate. Yunho can do something simple yet devastating—like licking maple syrup from the edge of his thumb—and Hongjoong's nipples will peak and his dick will twitch and then they're making a repeat of that first airport bathroom all over again in the last stall of a Denny's.

“Unhealthy or not, it’s a reality of my job,” Hongjoong turns only enough to rub their cheeks together just to feel the rasp of day old stubble yet to be whisked away by Yunho’s fancy shaving foam he keeps stockpiled back at his own apartment. “Want to go grocery shopping with me?”

Yunho doesn’t respond in favor of pressing their mouths together gently for a few heart stopping moments while Hongjoong melts against him. Sometime later, after Hongjoong had started to lose his breath and broke away to pant, Yunho breathes hot against his ear and whispers, “You know my fridge is always well stocked.”

“What are you implying?” 

“Nothing,” Yunho pats Hongjoong’s hips once as punctuation. “Just making a statement, hyung.”

Hongjoong squints up at him but Yunho is only looking back with his usual guileless smile in place and lets it slide. There’s a part of himself—there will _always_ be a part of himself—that whispers tempting, venomous promises of living easy and carefree if only Hongjoong would stop trying so hard to make self-sustainable life choices. He’s got this once in a lifetime opportunity to quit his job and live in the lap of luxury, and only the intense anxiety of letting go of too much all at once is keeping Hongjoong from giving the airline the middle finger and the apartment building his final rent check attached to a photocopied picture of his ass. 

Yunho kisses him again, just a singular peck this time, “Mind if we make a pit stop at my place? I want to get out of this shirt before it decides to learn how to walk.”

Hongjoong laughs, because only a day after Yunho’s serendipitous arrival at his front door and the worn out shirt he’d been wearing since is stiff and crusted down the left side with something that might be tacky dried lube. “Probably for the best.”

Yunho goes through the motions of locating his wallet and his keys and his other shoe since it’s gone missing from the usual place by the door. Hongjoong watches him from his perch sitting on his kitchen counter, absentmindedly noting the sway of Yunho’s hips as he leans down to search beneath the coffee table. “Hey, Yunho.”

“Hey, Hongjoong,” Yunho responds in a distracted tone, still leaning down in search of Nike #2. 

Hongjoong flicks his tongue out to wet his lips. “Come here.”

“Did you find my other shoe? I swear I have no idea how it could have wandered—” Yunho cuts himself off when he finally takes notice of Hongjoong’s heated stare. “Oh.”

“Mmm.”

“No shoe?”

“No,” Hongjoong beckons him forward with the crook of one finger. “No shoe.”

It takes Yunho, with his long legs and longer stride, exactly three steps before he’s threading his fingers through the homemade rips in Hongjoong’s faded Banana Republic jeans and slanting their mouths together with a quiet groan. Yunho’s missing shoe is actually hidden beneath the discarded lump of his jacket, but by the time they find it—by the time they’re _finished_ —it’s late and Yunho decides to whisk Hongjoong away to his home with its well stocked fridge for the rest of the evening.

**\----------------**

It’s easy enough to hide the ring on its new silver chain beneath his flight uniform, but harder to hide the nervous fidgeting he does when the edge of the gemstones tap against the metal in his chest. This is the first time he’s worn it outside of his and Yunho’s spaces without having his boyfriend around for Hongjoong to grab at one of his huge warm hands as an anchor against the tidal wave of anxiety. Hongjoong hopes the reality of commitment will stop making his hands shake sometime soon, because doling out tiny plastic cups of soda in the middle aisle of a moving juttering plane is hard enough on its own.

Yujin is doing a separate rotation this week and won’t be around to the worst of Hongjoong’s stumbling, but unfortunately he’s been stuck with Choi Seungmin. Again. Choi Seungmin, who still hasn’t figured out how to co-manage a flight full of needy soccer moms and wannabe French aristocracy.

“Hongjoong-sunbaenim,” Seungmin rubs his palms together in supplication behind the curtain of the attendant’s station. “Can you please take care of the guy in D12? This is the third time the chime has gone off and they’re about to double boost points in my game.”

A muscle in Hongjoong’s left eye begins to spasm. “Seungmin-ssi, you have _got_ to put the game away and do your job.”

“Hyung-nim, this is the last week I’m playing, I swear, I promised my little brother I’d boost his account before I came back home.” Seungmin flinches when the little light above D12 dings again. “Please, he’s the one that was bumped down from first class and is pissed they seated him next to the boy with the service dog.”

Hongjoong scrubs a hand through his hair and sighs. “Alright,” Seungmin immediately brightens, “But after this flight, if you pull out that fucking phone I will throw it and you out of the emergency exit.” Seungmin has the decency to be sufficiently threatened and goes pale. “Understood?”

“Understood,” Seungmin ducks his head. An alarm on his phone starts to sound just as the chime for D12 does, and he dives for the nearest attendant’s seat so he can hyper focus on whatever it is playing across his screen.

“...And the little kid wasn’t even doing anything! His service dog was quiet but dickbag with the four year old Burberry blazer decided they were breathing too much in his personal space or something,” Hongjoong folds another undershirt angrily in the middle of Yunho’s bed. “I was so tempted to dump the entirety of the biohazard bin over his head.”

Yunho is actually doing work at home, glasses perched on the end of his nose and laptop propped over his thighs while he lounges next to Hongjoong with his ankles crossed. “I’m proud that you didn’t, hyung,” Hongjoong revels in the soothing hand scraping down the middle of his back. “You showed some real restraint.”

“Thank you,” Hongjoong sniffs and rolls over to lean his head against Yunho’s chest. “What are you working on?”

“Expense reports,” Hongjoong feels the press of lips against the crown of his head and lets himself smile like an idiot at the display of easy affection. “Trying to figure out the best way to turn a three million won purchase at Dior into a business venture.”  
  
Hongjoong drags a nail down Yunho’s inseam. “What did you buy in Dior?”

“That’s for _me_ to know and for _you_ to find out,” Yunho snarks back.

Hongjoong sits up to glare down at him. “Yunho.”

“Hongjoong.” Yunho is only pretending to be a snarky asshole and Hongjoong knows it.

Annoyed with the standoff, Hongjoong reaches over to close the laptop and shifts it out of Yunho’s lap so he can sit there instead. Yunho only stares placidly back, grinning like the cat who caught the canary. “Tell me.”

“No,” Yunho runs his palms under and up Hongjoong’s shirt to thumb over his nipples, hooks a finger through the chain around Hongjoong’s neck to drag him down for an open-mouthed kiss. Hongjoong lets him, allows Yunho to have this one moment to be in control before he untangles the chain from Yunho’s fingers to remove the delicate wire frames from Yunho’s face and gently placing them on the bedside table.

“Tell me what you bought and I’ll be nice to you,” Hongjoong coos, rubbing over the metal teeth of Yunho’s zipper where it’s starting to bulge out from Yunho’s erection. He watches in satisfaction as Yunho’s breath hitches on an inhale and the pulse in his neck visibly kicks up.

Yunho stays quiet for a long moment before he finally asks, voice already thick with arousal, “What if I don’t want you to be nice?”

Hongjoong smirks, tongue lolling out to rub the metal barbell through the middle against his own lips.

The night ends with Hongjoong’s knees on either side of Yunho’s head while he fucks into the wet gape of his mouth, laughing a little snidely when Yunho gags on a too deep thrust and tears drip in rolling waves down his cheeks to mix with the drool falling to his chest. “Feel like telling me now?” Yunho can’t actually speak, mouth and throat stuffed full with dick as it is, but the grip he’s got on Hongjoong’s thighs stays slack in disagreement. 

“Thought so,” Hongjoong smirks and roughly scrapes both hands through Yunho’s hair to jerk his head forward against the slow roll of his hips. “Is this what you dreamed of for married life, mh? Choking on dick every night?”

Yunho is keeping his jaw slack, tongue flicking upwards as much as he can against the underside of Hongjoong’s prick, while his hips make abortive little jerks to get any kind of friction against the still locked zipper of his jeans. He’s being so obedient it makes Hongjoong want to be nice—just a little.

“Yunho, baby boy,” Hongjoong feels the telltale tightening in his gut, “‘m close, where—”

Yunho furrows his brows and sucks hard, hollowing his cherry red cheeks, and it takes one—two angry thrusts before Hongjoong hisses through his teeth and comes, Yunho crying and gagging harder against the intrusion. 

It’s only when Hongjoong is wiping the mess away from Yunho’s face with a soft cloth and rubbing lip balm along the abused stretch of Yunho’s mouth that he asks, “What _did_ you buy from Dior?”

“Just a couple of belts,” Yunho tells him, voice a husky rasp that makes Hongjoong tingle because he _did that_. “It’s just too fun to rile you up, I couldn’t resist.”

“Ass.” Hongjoong laughs. “But, speaking of, is there anything I can do for you? You didn’t...”

Yunho, who was still a shiny pink from earlier, colors darker and shakes his head. “No, I—I did.”

Hongjoong stops his slow administration of balm to blink, gobsmacked. “You—Just from—” Yunho nods, obviously embarrassed and Hongjoong feels his heart swell. “Oh, _Yunho_ ,” Hongjoong cups Yunho’s precious face between his hands, “I do love you.”

Yunho’s eyes scrunch closed when smiles back. “Love you too, jagiyah.”

**\----------------**

Two weeks later, Park Yujin is bent double on the empty boarding ramp leading to their Incheon-London connection laughing her ass off while Hongjoong reevaluates his life choices and his most valued friendship. “You— _you_ ,” Yujin barely chokes out between gasping breaths. “ _You_ rejected _him_? Hongjoong-ah, I’m—” She breaks off to snort into her hands. “I cannot believe this, just so you know. Now,” Yujin straightens both her spine and her wrinkled skirt to hold a palm out flat just under Hongjoong’s nose. “Show me the rock.”

“It’s not _a_ rock,” Hongjoong murmurs as he drops the ring, still connected to the Chanel chain, into Yujin’s dainty hand. 

Yujin whistles low when she holds the ring up to the light. The glittering blue of the diamonds seem especially bright against the backdrop of the morning sunrise filtering through the shaded windows. “Your man has taste, Hong-ie.”

“So do I,” Hongjoong tells her—smug. 

Yujin playfully smacks his shoulder but hands over the ring on its chain gently, one hand folded under Hongjoong’s trembling palm. She whispers quietly, with more emotion than he’s witnessed from her not directed at certain Gucci-wearing Japanese women, “I know we joke a lot about sugar babies and money, but I am so proud of you, Hongjoong. You deserve to be happy.” Yujin smiles watery-eyed and Hongjoong feels his own eyes go misty in self defense. “Tell him if he doesn’t treat you right, I will not hesitate to shove the pointy end of my favorite Louboutins up his asshole and not in the good way.”

Hongjoong heart beats a litany of endearments for this beautiful fierce woman, only barely keeps his chin from crumpling from the affection burning bright in his chest to tremulously ask, “Since when can you afford Louboutin, babyslut? Stop holding out on your oppa.”

“Fuck off,” Yujin whines at him—and then actually starts crying, effectively ruining both her carefully applied mascara and the lapels of Hongjoong’s uniform jacket when he pulls her close.

**\----------------**

London is dark and foggy and pissing rain by the time their flight touches down in Heathrow, though it feels like that’s always the case when Hongjoong arrives especially after long flights. Yujin helps him wave through the departing passengers and together they do the meticulous up-and-down search of the aisles for lost belongings and tourist litter.

“What’s your prize this time?” Yujin calls from the back end of economy plus towards Hongjoong’s current position near first class. “I found a broken watch!”

“Just a bunch of peanut wrappers and barf bags for me,” Hongjoong laughingly responds. “Hey, want to go visit Chloé while we’re here?”

“And get kicked out for critiquing their designs again? Hell no.” Yujin hands him her bag of ill-gotten treasure (read: trash) for Hongjoong to dispose of. “I still can’t walk by the outlet back home without having nightmares.”

“It’s not my fault they were trying to charge almost a million won for a _jersey_ crop top.” Hongjoong grumbles. He may have failed out of college, and subsequently failed his lifelong dream of creating his own line of ready-wear, but he knows for a fucking fact a label printed on a jersey t-shirt costs less than something anyone could pick up from Uniqlo for a mere fraction of the price. It was _criminal_.

“You’re such a snob,” Yujin tells him fondly before linking their elbows together and waltzing from the plane to pick up their luggage for the overnight stay. “I want to go to Harrod’s. And Gucci.”

“I will never understand your obsession with that brand.” 

Yujin only hums and leans into his side. “It’s an acquired taste.”

Hongjoong stares at the crush of bodies milling about the terminal before them. “If you even think about buying a pair of slides, I will bodily deposit you in the Chloé storefront with a note stuck to your forehead to ask you about cotton jersey.”

Someone jostles Hongjoong’s elbow hard enough that it makes his entire arm twinge. _Fucking_ _London_ , Hongjoong scowls at the back of a group of loud Americans noisily bumping into anything and everything in their path. Yujin winces in sympathy and rubs a soothing palm against the ache.

Yujin tries to distract him with, "Do Seonghwa and Yeosang know about your weird pseudo-engagement yet?"

"Um, not yet, no," Hongjoong nervously fidgets with the strap of his overnight bag. "I was going to tell them when I introduce them to Yunho."

He has to steady Yujin by her elbow when she stumbles, nearly twisting her ankle in her sensible uniform heels. "You haven't introduced them yet? Hongjoong, what are you doing? Those boys love and feed you and you don't even bring them your boyfriend for their approval!"

"You are so overdramatic," Hongjoong rolls his eyes, and fondly recalls the first time Yujin and Seonghwa were left in the same room. Much to Yeosang's amusement and Hongjoong's chagrin, the two got on like a house on fire and spent the majority of their time together trading indecent stories about bathroom hookups and making fun of Hongjoong's stroke game. "They've both already given me their blessing when I told them I have a key to his penthouse."

"You had a _key_ to his _penthouse_ and didn't even tell _me_?" Yujin slaps the back of her hand against her forehead as if she's about to faint. "Oppa, how could you?"

“Whatever,” Hongjoong squints at the long line in front of the currency exchange kiosks and feels nauseous at the implied wait. “By the way, how’s choking on Akira’s dick been going for you?”

Yujin’s scream of outrage is drowned out by the swell of the crowd and Hongjoong’s laughter.

**\----------------**

He and Yujin end up splitting a room at the Crowne Plaza instead of slumming at the airline accommodations, because it’s close enough to be convenient for tomorrow morning’s red-eye and because Yujin demands all the details of Hongjoong’s trip to Disney which he is not going to share while two of his direct superiors snore in the next sleep pod over. Even so, he only shares the PG version that doesn’t include getting railed in Cinderella’s Castle and blushes clear to his hairline when Yujin asks, “Wait, was he going to propose during the firework show?”

“I—” A good question, if Hongjoong is honest. He knows now that Yunho disappeared to buy the ring at some point during the trip but did that mean he was going to propose that day? Surely not, holy shit.

Yujin bounces eagerly on her knees on the plush queen bed across from him. “You should call him and ask!”

Hongjoong clutches a pillow tight to his chest as a barrier against her unrelenting enthusiasm for gossip. “Yujin-ah, it’s like six in the morning back home, Yunho isn’t going to be awake.” 

“Just _try_ ,” Yujin wheedles at him. When that doesn’t work, she orders room service complete with bubbling alcohol and plies Hongjoong with champagne until he’s loose-lipped and pulling up his contacts on FaceTime.

Yunho picks up on the second ring. He looks very awake for someone with their hair a tangled wreck and sleep clinging at the corners of his eyes. He’s still warm and sleep-soft and Hongjoong misses him so much in that moment that he has to physically hold back the hysterical urge to start crying.

“Jagiyah, is everything alright? You never call this early.” 

“Hi, baby,” Hongjoong fails at holding back his tears, starts sniffling, and blames it entirely on the strong champagne and Yujin. In the background, Yujin is cupping her hands across her mouth to muffle her over excited screaming. “Did I wake you up?”

“Nah, I’ve been awake for a while.” On screen, Yunho’s image crackles from the distant connection. “What’s up?”

“I, um, I wanted to ask,” Hongjoong stumbles enough that Yujin forcibly removes the phone from his hand to squeal, “He wants to know if you were going to propose at Disney!”

“Oh my god!”

“What?” She giggles at him, just as much of an unrelenting asshole as Hongjoong is himself and suddenly he appreciates it much less than he used to. “That was your question! Jeong Yunho-ssi,” she addresses the pinched expression of sleepy CEO, “I got him drunk so he could ask and he still couldn’t pull through. You sure you want to marry this wuss?”

“Pretty sure, yeah, if he’d let me.” Yunho laughs. Hongjoong stares at Yujin staring back at him and they both make overwhelmed noises into their respective pillows. Yujin almost throws his phone in her haste to hand it back, too overcome by tears to look at the screen any longer.

“Good morning, by the way,” Hongjoong mutters once he can speak without getting choked up. “I’d apologize for her but I’ve pretty much raised Yujin into my mirror image at this point.”

“Good morning. Or I guess it’s evening for you,” Yunho smiles back, neatly sidestepping the question. “When are you coming home?”

 _Home_. Hongjoong still hasn't figured out if that means Seoul or his own apartment or Yunho’s penthouse or Yunho’s arms.

“Tomorrow.” Hongjoong wipes at a tear trying to make its great escape down his cheek. “I’ll be home tomorrow.”

Yunho yawns wide, not even bothering to cover his mouth so Hongjoong has a clear view of his molars. “Good. And hyung?”

“Hm?”

“For what it’s worth, I was going to propose in front of the castle _after_ the fireworks.” 

Hongjoong doesn’t bother to try and clear away the drunken tears running for the drop off point of his chin. “Cheesy.”

Yunho blows him a kiss and disconnects the call. Yujin tackles Hongjoong into his mattress and they curl together like weepy children until the alcohol and the drain of tears lull them to sleep.

**\----------------**

Another week goes by, and then another, until one day Hongjoong enters his own apartment and realizes he doesn’t live there anymore.

He’s just arrived back from a continuous back and forth from Incheon to Jeju, but it’s crawling close to 3 A.M. and Hongjoong doesn’t want to show up at Yunho’s place because it’s the middle of the week and Yunho has an important shareholder meeting in less than eight hours. The first flicker of overhead lighting reveals a thin coating of dust on his coffee table and his lamp shades, and a stack of mail three inches thick shoved through the slot of his door—all junk. The fridge is still empty from the cleanout, though orange thing in the corner has sprouted greenery and possibly the civilizations from the crisper drawer have survived after all, migrants making the trek from the bottom to reside closer to the coolant.

When he checks his wardrobe and his sliding drawers for pajamas, Hongjoong finds most of his clothing has migrated as well.

Hongjoong stands in the middle of his apartment and breathes deep to quell the earthquake centering at the ring resting against his chest.

It takes the Uber driver less than fifteen minutes to hustle him from his apartment to the geometric skyline of highrises thanks to the late evening traffic. Hongjoong pays through the app and hands the man a single Jeju tangerine as extra thanks for putting up with the frantic bounce of Hongjoong’s knees. 

The lobby of the highrise apartments is stark white and aggressively modern. Faux greenery sit in silent exclamation points against clear glass tables with metal legs and backache inducing short chairs from Sotheby’s. Kim Eunjung, the old receptionist Hongjoong has decided to befriend by leaving trinkets and souvenirs on her desk every other visit, is nowhere to be found, so he leaves a note and another pile of tangerines to share with her granddaughter.

Yunho’s coffee table is shiny and free of dust. His fridge is stocked. There’s a bottle of watermelon lemonade that Yunho despises sitting half empty on a bottom shelf. When Hongjoong hauls himself into the bedroom, he stares at the overflowing wardrobe and finally allows himself to take in the unmistakable signs of cohabitation.

The panic is back.

The panic is back because Hongjoong has never wanted something so much and so desperately in his life, and the thought of losing this—the thought of Yunho walking away or telling him to leave or realizing Hongjoong really isn’t a good enough person to date, let alone _marry_ —leaves him clutching desperately at the stuttering beat of his heart slamming into his ribs. Standing in the bedroom of Yunho’s apartment is like standing in the absolute center of a hurricane; calm, but the edges are seething in turmoil.

Yunho is still snoring in gentle wheezing gasps when Hongjoong slides into the huge king bed. He watches the steady rise and fall of Yunho’s chest, notes the trickle of drool puddling on the pillows, and loves him. Hongjoong tries to scoot close enough to touch without waking him, but as soon as he starts moving Yunho’s eyes squint open. “Hyung-ah, how was Jeju?”

“It was fine.” Hongjoong stares for a beat before, “Why didn’t you tell me I moved in?”

“I wasn’t going to say anything unless you did,” Yunho curls his arms forward to reach out in the dark. “Problem?”

"No," Hongjoong swallows hard around the lump sitting in his throat and imagines another cluster of locks around his heart crumbling to dust. “No problem.”

In the dark of the room, under the inky blackness beneath sheets covering their bodies, Hongjoong reaches back.

**\----------------**

“Your roots are showing pretty bad,” Hongjoong threads his fingers through Yunho’s fringe as they lounge together on the couch one lazy Sunday afternoon. “Are you going to keep the blue?”

“Nah,” Yunho reaches up so he can drag Hongjoong’s fingers down to smack a kiss to each tip easy-as-you-please. “I have an appointment to go back to black on Wednesday.”

Hongjoong imagines the fall of Yunho’s hair, the sweet cotton candy-esque color suddenly changing to inky gothic tones and fully accepts the heart attack it’s going to give him. “Ah.”

“Hyung-ah,” Yunho sits up. “Remember the conditions we talked about?” Hongjoong nods, nervous and wondering where this is going. “I have another party to attend this weekend. Come with me.”

“So you can parade me around to your business partners?” 

Yunho shakes his head. “It’s a charity gala but it’ll be a good opportunity to introduce you to some of my friends.”

Hongjoong pretends to consider it, biting the edge of a thumb nail, until Yunho gives him a wobbly-mouthed pout. “I’ll go.”

“Can I introduce you as my fiancé?” Yunho bounces on eager knees.

“Absolutely not,” Hongjoong laughs at him when Yunho wilts and presses his face into Hongjoong’s lap with a whine. “I haven’t accepted yet, you goon.”

Yunho breathes hot against Hongjoong’s sweatpants. “But you will,” his nose rubs in the crease where Hongjoong’s thigh meets his groin and he shifts his head just enough to look up, eyes blown dark as pitch, rubs his cheek against the stirring length of Hongjoong’s dick. “Because you love me.”

Instead of answering, Hongjoong only slides his sweats down enough that Yunho can suck him down and they don’t speak. They continue not to speak as Hongjoong pushes him face down into the couch and fucks Yunho fast and rough, still almost fully clothed while Yunho’s pants hang like a sad flag of surrender off one leg.

For the gala, Yunho buys him a custom Saint Laurent suit and another Cartier love bracelet. Hongjoong gives him a pair of silver cufflinks he bought in a boutique on the last London journey with Yujin. Yunho looks at them as if they’re the most precious of gemstones and holds his arms out for Hongjoong to add them to his jacket. “Hyung, you didn’t have to buy me anything.”

“I know,” Hongjoong murmurs mostly to himself fastening the last clasp. “But you’re always buying me things so I thought I’d return the favor for once.”

Before Hongjoong can retreat and hide his face in the bathroom—so he can pretend he doesn’t exist while the invisible looming spectre of Han Jaejin mocks him from a dark corner—Yunho pulls him forward by his lapels to land a wet smacking kiss to the edge of Hongjoong’s mouth. “Thank you,” Yunho tells him sincerely. No hint of sarcasm, even though Yunho could realistically buy the whole store several times over.

Hongjoong feels himself go red while Yunho continues to peck every inch of his skin until Hongjoong kicks at the edges of his shiny leather Manolo oxfords. “Don’t we have somewhere we need to be?”

The first person Hongjoong meets standing outside of the event hall is Choi Jongho, the previously glossed over bodyguard Yunho failed to mention for several months, and the man flushes a dark crimson when they shake hands. “I know way too much about you, Kim Hongjoong-ssi,” Jongho cringes his nose a little, “I’m so sorry.”

“Do I want to know what those things are or…” 

Jongho cringes harder, face paling awkwardly against the strain, while Yunho coughs equally shy in the background holding a hand against Hongjoong’s back. “Probably not.”

“Super,” Hongjoong stares into the middle distance and dreams of the days he could dissociate on command. “Great.”

“Anyway, we’re going to leave now, see you in a bit, Jongho-yah,” Yunho pushes Hongjoong forward until they disappear into the sea of black suits and sequin studded dresses. It’s about as familiar as the last shindig Yunho brought him to, though there are obviously more wives and showy call girls hanging from different arms this time around. The hall is decorated in gold streamers and crystalline chandeliers dangling over long tables covered in chilled wine and cheese plates. There’s a chocolate fountain calling Hongjoong’s name at the furthest edge.

Yunho doesn’t let him wander far, always dragging him back in to conversations with beady-eyed career businessmen about stocks or the weather. Hongjoong shares several pained grimaces with bored escorts.

The second person Hongjoong meets, truly meets and remembers, is apparently Yunho’s old college roommate moonlighting as the company-hired photographer of the night. “Choi San,” the man smiles at him as they exchange handshakes, dimples popping in attractive dents on the edges of his mouth. “You must be the flight attendant that our Yunho here can’t keep his mouth shut about.”

He’s intimidatingly handsome, all sharp jawline and sharper eyes and pink mouth, and it leaves Hongjoong feeling awkward and weak-kneed the longer he watches Yunho laugh—the high pitched squeaky one that Hongjoong only pulls out of him when he’s really trying to be funny. They exchange pleasantries before San launches into a story about the Gangnam shareholders.

Hongjoong sips his champagne and filters out the noise. Yunho is listening to San’s story with every outward sign of intent, while Hongjoong watches San’s fingers caress the edge of Yunho’s elbow. From his elbow down to the curve of Yunho’s palm to the tips of his fingers before squeezing and releasing. White noise buzzes in Hongjoong’s ears, he forgets to breathe, and the champagne turns to ash in his mouth. 

He never once considered himself a jealous person. Hongjoong honestly didn’t think he was capable of it with his penchant for one night stands and watching Seonghwa and Yeosang fuck on top of him, but, clearly, he was wrong. He was _so_ wrong.

San gives him a smirking side eye when Hongjoong tugs Yunho’s sleeve to whisper in his ear, “I’m going to step outside for some air.”

Yunho frowns back. “Everything alright?”

“Everything’s fine,” Hongjoong grins—more of a grimace, he knows—before leaning up to kiss the smooth edge of Yunho’s jawline like a mark of possession. “Feel a little claustrophobic, I’ll be back in a minute.”

“If you’re sure,” Yunho squeezes his palm tight, “Get Jongho to help you find me again.”

**\----------------**

Yunho watches the sway of Hongjoong’s hips as he walks away and only barely resists the very real urge to bite his knuckles from the want. San smacks him in the stomach. “So that’s your man, huh.”

“Yeah,” Yunho dreamily agrees. He doesn’t turn around until the lone bob of Hongjoong’s engine red hair disappears beyond the double doors leading to the lobby. “That’s him.”

“Little short, isn’t he,” San says it bland, he says most things blandly unless it’s really interesting or he wants something. “Don’t you usually go for tall ones?”

Yunho rolls his eyes. Just because he dated two guys taller than himself in college doesn’t mean he has a _type_. Unless that type is just attractive and mean and easily foldable, which, maybe. “In case you forgot, I dated _you_ and you’re barely taller than him.”

San scowls. “Shut up. What’s his deal anyway, you keeping him?”

Yunho wants to say he’s going to marry him. He wants to climb on the nearest table and yell out loud for everyone to hear that he loves Kim Hongjoong and he’s going to husband the fuck out of him, but what he says instead is, “I’m trying.”

Because Hongjoong is skittish in the worst way. Yunho can only imagine the reasons with how Hongjoong will sometimes start trembling when they do anything remotely domestic and quietly hyperventilate until he has to leave the room or turn it into an excuse to have sex. Someday he’s going to find out, he’s probably going to be incandescently angry over it, and then he’s going to reassure Hongjoong just how much he’s committed to this until they’re old and gray and have liver spots decorating their balding heads. 

Love and affection blindside him at the worst moment, and Yunho spins to hide the blur of tears from any prying eyes. 

“Dude,” San hisses and drags him away to hide behind a marble column. “Are you fucking _crying_?”

He is. Yunho cries harder when he goes to wipe his tears with the edge of his suit sleeves and catches the silver rounds of the cuff links Hongjoong went out of his way to buy just for him. “I have to go.”

“Yeah, you probably should,” San still has a hand attached to the edge of Yunho’s elbow, and leads him through a nearby exit door leading to hallway free of judgmental shareholder dicks. “First left will take you to the front entrance, your whatever is probably out there waiting for you.”

“Thank you, San-ie,” Yunho sniffs hard. “You’re my best friend.”

“I’m like your only friend, idiot, now get out before you embarrass yourself.” San literally kicks him in the ass before slamming the door closed, taking with him the loud hum of too many voices speaking at once and the smell of too much perfume wafting in an enclosed space.

Yunho finds Hongjoong where San guessed, leaning against the double doors, quietly speaking to Jongho and gesticulating in wide sweeps in demonstration of something. He’s barely calmed himself down when Hongjoong stops in the middle of whatever he’s describing to hold a palm flat against his chest, right over his heart, and Yunho feels the world tilt-shift and fall away as he watches Hongjoong start smiling, dragging the chain holding his ring up and out to show Jongho.

If anyone asked him later, he’d say he teleported from the end of the long walkway leading to the dark entrance to standing in front of Hongjoong, cupping his beautiful flushed pink cheeks, and kissing the air from his lungs until they’re both dizzy. 

Hongjoong smiles up at him confused when they finally separate, “Not that I’m complaining, but what was that about?”

Jongho coughs quietly in the background. Yunho ignores him. “Just because I wanted to.” _Because I can_ , he doesn’t say. _Because you love me_ , repeated like a mantra with every beat of his blood.

**\----------------**

Yunho is slowly mouthing his way around the barbells in Hongjoong’s nipples when the jittery panic finally rears its ugly, self doubting head and Hongjoong blurts out: “I’m basically a high class prostitute.”

Yunho immediately stops his journey across Hongjoong’s chest to stare at him while Hongjoong groans into his palms slapped against his face in mortification. “Um.”

“Oh my god, just,” Hongjoong rolls away to bury his nose into Yunho’s enormous stack of pillows. “Ignore me, I’m so fucking stupid, holy shit.”

“No, no, we should talk about this,” Yunho crawls his way back up the length of Hongjoong’s body to place a brief kiss against the topmost notch of Hongjoong’s spine. “It’s obviously been bothering you enough to interrupt my totally smooth bedroom moves.” Hongjoong snorts and feels Yunho’s answering grin against the skin of his back. “Not a big fan of the label you’re putting on yourself but, for what it’s worth, I already know. You _did_ suck me off in a bathroom in the middle of an airport the first time I met you.”

“Shut up,” Hongjoong burrows further into the relative safety of the sateen covered down. “I just meant,” he sucks in a tight breath against the mattress, “I just meant you shouldn’t be settling for someone like me when you could have, like, a millionaire governor's son without all the sordid sexual history.”

“I’m not settling for anything with you,” Hongjoong can feel Yunho swinging his legs over to rest against either side of his hips, feels the crisp cotton of Yunho’s fancy underwear bunch against the swell of his ass. “Hongjoong, jagiyah,” Yunho presses his mouth, still wet, against Hongjoong’s ear and rasps out, “ _Yeobo_.”

Every bit of air Hongjoong thought he had saved in his lungs immediately evaporates into nothingness. Any time he’s reminded of their impending nuptials—the reality Hongjoong is pretending he’s rejected completely and definitely isn’t speeding for a head on collision towards him—it’s as if someone grabs him by the shoulders to forcibly shake him while also injecting what feels like seven energy drinks directly into his veins. “Yunho, you can’t — that’s _cheating_!”

“ _Yeobo-yah_ ,” Yunho breathes against his ear like the shithead he is and Hongjoong can hear the self satisfied smirk in his voice when Hongjoong can’t hold back the shiver of arousal. Somewhere behind him is the distinct click of the lube bottle being opened. “You know I don’t care about what you did in the past beyond the fact that you’re here with me now. I accept you,” Yunho sucks a mark against the side of his neck not barricaded in by Yunho’s stupid expensive pillows. “I love you,” Hongjoong feels Yunho’s fingers dig against his hips as his underwear is peeled back slow, slow, “I was going to ask you to marry me before I even had concrete evidence that you loved me back.”

The first touch of the cold lube against the hot clench of his ass makes Hongjoong tremble down to the roots of his hair. “Yunho, that’s not fair to you,” the digit circles once before Yunho slips in to the first knuckle, “Why would you risk marriage to someone that doesn’t love you?”

“Because I know my chances of finding someone that would love me for me was going to be next to zilch anyway, not with my position at the company,” Yunho’s finger drags just shy of Hongjoong’s prostate—just a tease of almost pleasure that sets his teeth on edge with want, “And being with you made me happy enough that I didn’t care if you didn’t love me back.”

“Yunho,” Hongjoong sobs against the mattress, drool making a slow trek out of the corner of his mouth from the addition of another lubed finger working into his opening, the delicious burn of being stretched open making it hard to articulate how sad that is. “Yunho-yaaaah.”

Yunho’s clean hand uncurls the fist Hongjoong has clenched full with sateen to lace their fingers together, sweet and totally at odds with the pulsing, slow fucking of his other arm. “Lucky for me, I knew you at least felt something after that night you got drunk in your getup with the skirt.”

Hongjoong doesn’t know what he’s talking about, can’t even fathom making his brain work when there are fingers rubbing so good and so right against his walls that his dick actually hurts from how turned on he is. “A-ah?”

The fingers in his ass make a cruel twisting motion, Yunho’s thumb dragging in a tight circle against the skin beneath, and Hongjoong swallows back a pitiful sounding mewl, “I made you horrible burned toast the morning after and you ate it like it was actually good.” Yunho’s tongue licks a trail from the tip of one ear down until he can bite gently against the pulsing vein in Hongjoong’s neck. “Any other time you would have kicked me in the face.”

“I could—I could kick you in the face now,” Hongjoong mutters, shifting his hips up enough that he can work a hand between himself and the mattress to get some semblance of relief. He’s barely managed to wedge the tip of his dick into his fist when Yunho forcibly flips him over and wrenches his hand away. Hongjoong debates kicking him anyway on principle. 

Yunho must have some preternatural sixth sense because he wastes no time bending Hongjoong’s legs at the knees and presses a kiss to the center of each arch. “You wouldn’t unless I asked you to.” 

“So ask me. Give me a reason,” Hongjoong sobs as Yunho rubs lube in the gap of his thighs over the fine hairs, one huge hand holding his legs together by his ankles.

“Nah,” Yunho tells him sweetly, hooking Hongjoong’s legs over one shoulder and slicking his dick to fuck the hot wet head between Hongjoong’s slicked skin. The first stab of Yunho’s cockhead into the space beneath Hongjoong’s balls makes him choke on a groan, makes his chest heave and his dick jump. “But hyung,” Yunho kicks his hips up hard, cock dragging close enough for Hongjoong to feel it against his own, “You’re not a prostitute. You’re not a callboy or an escort,” he punctuates each word with a sharp thrust, “You fuck me because you love me.”

Bizarrely, Hongjoong feels like crying. He feels like he’s going to float up and out of his skin without Yunho’s hands on his knees and his hip to keep him anchored to the bed. His nails catch on the edge of one pillow. “Yunho—”

“Say it,” Yunho growls down at him still pistoning his hips in angry bursts and the drag of it is going to make Hongjoong go insane, “Tell me you love me.”

“Love you,” Hongjoong burbles, feels like it’s being wrenched out of him by force, “I love you so much I can’t handle it sometimes.” 

It’s hot and wet and claustrophobic. His thighs burn, and right as Hongjoong is babbling nonsense about the orgasm pulsing in his groin, Yunho bites against his heel.

Hongjoong gets cum almost to his chin. It ends up marking the chain and the ring around his neck, and when Yunho finally finds his own release, he jerks lines to match.

Another strand of the anxious ball of nerves Hongjoong holds onto like a lifeline unravels and falls away.

**\----------------**

****Korean Air introduces a new service direct to Dubai and an additional connecting series of flights to Thailand. Hongjoong is assigned to both, on different weeks, and meets another handful of equally useless Choi Seungmin work-alikes he hates on sight. Kim Jonghee and Park Soonbok spend more time gossiping about idols than they do actually practicing their jobs, so Hongjoong ends up picking up the slack handling barf bags and idiots with their laptops open before takeoff.

He gets to spend less and less time with Yujin and buys Eunjung increasingly bizarre souvenirs to compensate the loss. Eunjung trades him a plate of homemade maejakgwa for a Benjarong vase Hongjoong has to keep wrapped in layers of wrinkled crepe paper held between his knees on the long flight home. They taste sugar sweet; like home and like every homesick fantasy Hongjoong envisions in the quiet nights spent sleeping beneath Turkish linens.

Eunjung accepts his latest gift, a silver dallah with intricate metalworking burnished into the spout, with her mouth pinched tight in obvious worry. “Hongjoong-ssi, how are you feeling these days?”

Hongjoong blinks. It’s unlike her to ask an actual question beyond potential food allergens and spice preferences. “I’m fine?”

Eunjung narrows her eyes at him, flinty-eyed intimidation radiating from every pore. “Hongjoong-ssi, I don’t mean to pry, but you’ve been coming through less and less lately, and every time you look more and more tired even to these old eyes,” Eunjung presses a bottle of ginseng energy drink into his palms and quietly adds, “Jeong Yunho-ssi comes in from work like a man returning from the assembly line.”

Hongjoong doesn’t know how to respond to that, so he clutches the energy drink tight to his chest and tells her, “Thank you,” before inserting his key in the elevator to take him to the top floor. It hurts, it really hurts knowing that he’s missing so much of Yunho’s day or his problems without the option to come home at the end of each day to soothe away the ache.

The maserati was in the parking garage so Hongjoong expects Yunho to be sitting in his office or playing an obnoxiously violent game on the console in the theater area. He finds Yunho asleep in his bed, still in his suit, holding tight to the pillow from what has since been designated as Hongjoong’s side of the bed.

Hongjoong stares at the softly breathing curl of Yunho’s back for long moments before dropping his overnight bag with a quiet thump and inserting himself into the pillow’s place. Yunho wakes only enough to pull him close and hook a foot around Hongjoong’s ankle.

**\----------------**

They wake up close to two in the afternoon the next day. It’s a Saturday though, which means nowhere for Yunho to be and nothing for Hongjoong to be doing, so Hongjoong spends as much time as he likes sucking marks against Yunho’s spine in the middle of his king bed. He’s got Yunho starfished out, weeping gently as Hongjoong flicks his tongue lightning quick against his opening to tease him with the barbell. 

At some point, Yunho can’t take it anymore and shifts up to his knees to get a hand around his dick. Hongjoong lets him, for once unbothered by the disobedience, helps him along by replacing his tongue with his fingers and sucking the globes of Yunho’s balls into his mouth until Yunho is wailing and making a mess of the sheets.

Hongjoong is too exhausted to bother with his own erection, shakes his head when Yunho offers to finish him off in favor of running them a bubble bath and relaxing into the warmth of the water and Yunho’s chest. 

“Hyung-ah, about the airline—”

“What about the airline?” Hongjoong huffs, head thunking against Yunho’s shoulder, “Yunho, what would I even do if I quit my job? I failed out of University years ago.”

Yunho is quiet for a long moment scooping bubbles to pile against the curve of Hongjoong’s kneecap. “Well for one, you have me to back you up now,” the wobbling mound goes sliding off Hongjoong’s left knee so Yunho switches to the right. “For two, Hongjoong, you can tell fabrics and brands apart in less time than it takes me to read a label. You have a stack of fashion centric magazines by our bed”—Hongjoong’s traitorous, eternally hopeless romantic heart goes stumbling at the admission of shared space— “why not try to go back to your dream of being a fashion designer?”

It’s a nice thought. Kim Hongjoong, fashion designer with clothing lines walking down runways in Milan, sounds like everything he dreamt of in high school and the first years spent in generic math classes in college. He also knows he’s out of practice and couldn’t draft a pattern if his life depended on it. “Baby—”

“Hyung,” Yunho interrupts him, “Just...think about it okay? Maybe make a few things and see where it takes you.” Yunho rubs his thumbs in deep massaging circles at the base of Hongjoong’s neck. “I’d much rather invest in you than some suckup daughter’s perfume line that’s going to flop six months after release.”

Hongjoong rolls the information around. Though he has to ask, “Why’d you even agree to invest in the first place if you know it’s going to fail?”

“He traded enough stock with the company for my support that I come out ahead in the long run,” Yunho snickers. Like a dog with a bone, Yunho refuses to drop the conversation, though. “So, fashion?”

“I’ll think about it. Creating a clothing line is harder than you seem to think,” Hongjoong shifts to kiss the edge of Yunho’s neck. The bubbles are starting to deflate and fade to less than foam. “I’d feel so useless not contributing though,” Hongjoong worries with the edge of one of Yunho’s nails. “You do so much and all I really provide you with is dick.”

“If it makes you feel any better, I happen to like dick.” Yunho laughs, brings a hand up to dangle the ring on its chain in front of Hongjoong’s nose. “You also love me, that’s more than enough for me.”

Hongjoong stares at the silver band with water dripping in tiny droplets from the cluster of blue diamonds. It’s the shape of a promise, of a soft place to land.

Voice barely audible, Hongjoong whispers, “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Okay,” Hongjoong takes the chain away from Yunho’s grasp. “I’ll think about it.”

**\----------------**

Hongjoong and Yunho’s schedules don’t sync up for nearly a month. By the time Hongjoong comes home from an international schedule, Yunho is floating off to a conference or doing some factory unveiling in another country or spending another night in his office because it’s the end of a quarter and whatever reports they work with don’t file themselves. They spend a lot of time on hurried whisper soft FaceTime calls, but texts and pictures do nothing to ease the ache of loneliness in the gaped open wound of Hongjoong’s heart.

It’s made worse when, one night while Hongjoong is on the Dubai circuit again, Yunho sniffs over their video call, “I just really want to hold you and it sucks that I can’t.”

“I know,” Hongjoong tries his best to put on a brave face, but the task is almost impossible with how badly he wants to do the same. He’s trying to distract himself with whatever is happening on MBC Drama. It doesn't work. “I miss you.”

Hongjoong watches, heart breaking again for the nth time in so many days, as Yunho’s face crumples, sobs echoing as if from loudspeakers over the shitty iphone connection. “I miss you, too,” Yunho cries, palm held over his mouth to block the worst of his noise, “I miss you all the time.”

Hongjoong is standing in the middle of an airbus aisle, food service cart overflowing with reheated meals, listening to a vegan hot-head bitch him out over her mushroom and tofu pilaf being warmed next to someone else’s beef burgundy when he has an epiphany. 

He hates this job. Hongjoong hates being in the air thousands of miles away from home; hates dealing with coworkers he barely tolerates; hates calling Yunho at two in the morning because it’s the only time Yunho will be awake and available for the day. He hates his paychecks that don’t even seem worth it anymore when Yunho is somewhere in Seoul asleep and probably happily dreaming of the wedding Hongjoong continues to avoid.

Hongjoong mechanically turns away from the woman trying to berate him for just doing his job and finishes the food service out like he’s having an out of body experience. 

His coworker, a mousy woman he learned the name of two years ago and immediately forgot because she was so nondescript and empty headed, gives him a strange look when Hongjoong sits heavily in his seat, trash bag still clutched in one fist because he needs the physical anchor. ‘ _I can’t do this anymore_ ,’ scrolls across his mind's eye like so much ticker tape in a continuous loop.

Before they’ve even landed at their destination, Hongjoong has already made an appointment with head office and drafted two versions of a resignation letter on his phone: one that says ‘fuck you’ and another that’s a touch more professional and burns much fewer bridges.

“I quit,” Hongjoong says the instant Yunho comes home, barely within the reach of the doorway and still pulling at the Windsor knot in his tie. “I quit the airline.”

Yunho looks as if he’s not even parsing the information. “You—?”

Hongjoong can only nod back. His heart is beating out of rhythm so hard and so fast he thinks he might be sick. Yunho drops everything in the entryway—his phone, his briefcase, the shoe from his left foot—to run full speed into Hongjoong’s arms.

“Thank you,” Yunho hiccups, fingers white knuckle tight in the fabric of Hongjoong’s Comme des Garçons shirt he’d bought as a last hurrah. “ _Thank you_ , I love you.”

At some point, Hongjoong’s knees wobble and they both go down like a lead balloon; his mind is a mess of terror and uncertainty and, in some measure, happiness.

**\----------------**

He’s immediately removed from the remaining list of flights for the month and Yujin sends him a text message that’s just forty question marks ending with an exclamation point and a wedding ring emoji. For the first time in weeks, Hongjoong ignores it in favor of setting up a coffee date—a friendly one, now, which is still strange when Hongjoong thinks about it too hard—with Seonghwa and Yeosang.

They take the news about as gracefully as Hongjoong expects, by which he means Yeosang claps agreeably and Seonghwa acts as if the world is ending.

“You quit the airline,” Seonghwa stares at him. Seonghwa continues to stare at him while Hongjoong tells his story for the third time in a secluded corner of the tiny bistro Yunho had brought him to the previous month. They have excellent crumbly muffins and finger sandwiches that are actually filling.

“For the last time,” Yeosang sighs, “That’s what Hongjoong-ah _just_ said. Clean your ears out, old man.”

“Call me old man again and I won’t feed you dick for a month,” Seonghwa hisses in dark baritones across the table. Yeosang bites into another triangle of cucumber and sweet bread, unmoved. “I just can’t believe it. We tried to get you to quit for years because you were so unhappy, and this man has you convinced after knowing him for not even _one_.”

“It _is_ a little shocking,” Yeosang adds.

“Yeah, well,” Hongjoong fidgets with a wadded paper wrapper of a straw and breathes deep to steel his nerves. “There is...one more thing that I haven’t told you guys.”

Seonghwa grabs the nearest utensil—a spoon—wielding it close to his chest like an emotional shield and eyes Hongjoong dubiously. Yeosang continues to work his way through the cucumber sandwiches, eyeing the tuna filled ones like he’s sizing them up for war. 

“Okay, look, before I show this to you two, you have to _promise_ not to freak out,” Hongjoong begs, hands folded together in supplication. Yeosang stops his slow attack on the finger sandwiches. 

“That sounds bad,” Seonghwa starts picking up napkins, “Why does that sound bad? Yeosang-ie, hold my hand so I don’t fall.”

“You’re not going to fall, hyung, stop saying that,” Yeosang huffs but deigns to grip Seonghwa’s fingers not occupied with paper. 

Hongjoong sends a final prayer to anyone in the universe willing to listen and tugs the chain up and over his head, quick—like he’s ripping off a bandaid. Seonghwa blinks at it, Yeosang blinks at it, they glance at each other before Seonghwa reaches out and taps the edge of the gemstones with the spoon. “This is a ring.”

“Amazing observation,” Hongjoong praises, dry. His pulse skyrockets the longer his two closest friends and would-be lovers stare at the silver bauble. 

“Hongjoong, are you telling me—”

Yeosang is cut off by Seonghwa starting to cry ugly, snotty tears and racing around the table to hug Hongjoong around the neck. “Hongjoong! Hong-ah, my _baby_ , my friend,” Seonghwa kisses his forehead and his cheeks and the corner of Hongjoong’s mouth, “I confess I’m a little sad, but I am still _so_ happy for you.”

“I haven't accepted the proposal yet, but thank you all the same,” Hongjoong sniffs back, his bad habit of being a terrible sympathetic crier rearing its ugly head.

Yeosang gets up to drop the necklace back around Hongjoong’s neck. “I want to meet him.”

Yeosang is hard to read sometimes. There are days where he spends most of his time giggling at news articles and walking around with adorable sweater paws, and other days where he’s a silent, frowning ghost haunting the walls of their apartment. Seonghwa says he just puts up a front because Yeosang feels too much all at once and has to hide it by being a bastard. 

Hongjoong takes in Yeosang’s thinning mouth, his misty overwhelmed eyes while Seonghwa babbles affectionate non-words smearing his fancy-ass bb cream into Hongjoong’s shirt, and tells them, “I’ll look over his schedule and get back to you.”

**\----------------**

Yunho pouts about it, but Hongjoong keeps his apartment to be the base of his operations. 

Backed into a hidden corner of the second bedroom he repurposed into an office is a sad dusty, rusty sewing machine that sits as the lone monument to his failed clothing empire. Hongjoong pulls it out, cleans it off, oils the old moving parts and sets it up in the center of his old living room amid a pile of newly purchased muslin and sewing supplies.

Yunho watches it all from his perch on Hongjoong’s couch with his lips pursed forward. “Hyung, you know it’s fine if you want to do this at my place, right? I have the room.”

“This is not even the start of my mess,” Hongjoong plies him with kisses until Yunho is smiling back, fingers hooked through the loops in Hongjoong’s jeans. “I wouldn’t want to ruin the aesthetic of your place anyway. Plus, knowing you, you’d probably end up tripping over something and getting needles in your face.” Hongjoong rubs Yunho’s shoulders placatingly, “Don’t worry, babe, we’re still cohabitating and you’ll still see me at the end of the day.”

“Fine,” Yunho grumbles low before lifting Hongjoong up by his waist to carry him into the dining room, ignoring Hongjoong’s squawks of outrage. “Come eat though, I brought you your regular order from the Greek place.”

**\----------------**

Korean Air, or at least Hongjoong’s direct superiors, apparently really like to throw parties considering he’s worked there for less than a decade and yet a banquet hall with a fully stocked open bar is rented out for his retirement decorated with cascading columns of color coordinated balloons. The room is packed. People he’s met _maybe_ once in his life decide to show up to pay homage to his work as a glorified tourist nanny.

Hongjoong invites Seonghwa and Yeosang so they can meet Yunho, and he can only hope the resulting collision between his two worlds doesn’t end in catastrophe. When they arrive, Yujin is already present and setting up camp at the bar, takes one look at the pair of them—Yunho in his newest Versace suit and Hongjoong in a three piece from All Saints—and makes a beeline towards them with her hands full with pinot grigio in tiny crystal glasses. 

“You _whore_ ,” Yujin slurs, shoving three flutes of wine at Yunho so she can grab Hongjoong by the ears and drag him down to face level, “Why didn’t you tell me you were actually quitting the business? I thought you were just taking a break to go get married! Without inviting me!” She pauses only long enough to get out one loud hiccup before she’s turning to address Yunho with, “I’ve already told Hong-ie this, but I swear to god, Yunho-ssi, if you mess this up I will shove the business end of a stiletto so far up your ass you’ll be spitting up leather for a _year_.”

Hongjoong laughs, entertained by everything that makes Yujin herself, and gently extracts her nails from his head. 

To the side, Yunho tells her with every ounce of sincerity, “If I mess up, I’ll make it easy for you and bend over first.”

“Good,” Yujin takes her three glasses back, apparently thinks better of it and hands Hongjoong one, half filled, “Who am I going to coordinate dick sucking adventures with? Oppa, this isn’t fair!”

Hongjoong sees Yunho spin around in his periphery to bite against his knuckles in a poor attempt at stifling laughter and kicks at the back of his shin for being a nuisance. “You can always call Seonghwa, you know how much he loves dick gossip.”

“That’s not the same!” Yujin mimes sobbing into Hongjoong’s shoulder, glass of wine held against each breast, “And Seonghwa has worse work hours than we do, he probably won’t respond in time to talk me out of a conquest.”

Technically untrue, because Seonghwa sets his own hours and while sometimes those hours are more in line with some kind of demon torture device than something a human could realistically accomplish, for the most part he lounges around at home in dramatic fashion draped over lounge chairs half-nude but for a silk robe. He’s got time. And dick sucking is his favorite topic bar none.

Hongjoong kisses the center of her forehead, “No one can talk you out of a conquest.”

“Ugh,” Yujin declares.

For her part, Yujin decides to take her role as Hongjoong’s dearest friend to mercilessly embarrass him by regaling Yunho with every horrible misstep Hongjoong has ever made in his quest to pay rent on someone else’s dime. Yunho laughs until he snorts, until he’s clinging desperately to the edges of Hongjoong’s blazer, and Hongjoong is only saved by the arrival of Yeosang dragging a pouting Seonghwa through the throng of people.

“Yeosang-oppa!” Yujin screeches at them, “Seonghwa-oppa!”

Seonghwa stops pouting to open his arms and pulls her tiny frame against his own, “Yujin-ah! It’s been too long,” Hongjoong watches the two of them fawn over each other— “Oppa, your hair looks so good back to black,” Yujin sighs, “ _Thank you_ , Yeosang said it made me look like I’m trying to join the Black Parade.”— and nudges Yeosang’s side with an elbow. “He’s in a good mood."

“Mm,” Yeosang agrees, mouth tilted upwards in a shy grin, “We found somebody before we came, Seonghwa is excited about it.”

“Yeah? That was quick.” 

Yunho dips his fingers between the gaps of Hongjoong’s own with a questioning noise low in his throat. Hongjoong squeezes back, _now or never_ , “Yeosang, this is Yunho, my—my, um—”

“We’re going with partner, for now,” Yunho laughs at him, smacking a kiss to the edge of Hongjoong’s ear, and holds a palm upwards and out, “Jeong Yunho.”

Yeosang accepts the handshake easily enough. “Kang Yeosang. The one making idiot noises behind me is Park Seonghwa, my husband,” Hongjoong watches Yeosang give Yunho one pursed mouth glare before asking, “Has Yujin given you the stiletto threat yet?”

“Yes,” Yunho’s answer is immediate and serious, “I told her I would bend over first to make it easier.”

“Good man.”

Hongjoong leaves them to talk business, since Yunho apparently recognizes Yeosang’s name from their latest acquisition, and sidles up to the cuddle puddle happening in the center of the banquet hall. “Yeosang says you found somebody,” directed at Seonghwa, gently rocking Yujin side to side like a proud father.

“Yeosang is a big blabbermouth,” Seonghwa responds, tart. “He’s been all giddy about it since the car ride over here.”

“Wow, that's a shock.” Yeosang being anything other than mildly interested was big. Yeosang showing interest in anything or anyone that was not Seonghwa or the latest drone on the market was big. “Let’s go get drinks to celebrate!”

“Drinks!” Yujin cheers. “For our Hongjoong leaving me high and dry in the sky!”

Hongjoong means to only have one glass of mediocre wine, but as coworkers make the slow trickle in and out of the work sponsored event, more and more glasses seem to appear and disappear from his hands. Yunho gives him water at some point, followed by a piece of vanilla cake covered in white frosting. 

Like many of Hongjoong’s drunk adventures, he ends up pulling Yunho into the nearest secluded bathroom to make out—mouths sticky with wine and cheap cake—and ends up on his knees, struggling with the Dior belt Yunho has looped around his waist. “This kinda takes you back, doesn’t it?” Hongjoong laughs when he can finally reach through the zipper to unveil Yunho’s straining erection.

“It really does,” Yunho groans down at him, one hand holding his shirt out of the way while the other buries itself in Hongjoong’s hair. Hongjoong circles the tip of his dick with his tongue, and Yunho whispers harsh, “I’m buying a bottle of Glenfiddich on the way home, I never made good on my promise.”

Hongjoong sucks him down, bobbing his mouth over the length of him a few times before backing off enough to say, “I can’t believe you remembered that.”

“If it’s _you_ ,” Yunho answers immediately, eyes zeroed in on Hongjoong’s face while his hips jerk from the speed of Hongjoong’s hand working him over. “I remember _everything_.”

Hongjoong wheezes out...something, he’s not sure, a tinny noise echoing in the bathroom stall while Yunho laughs. The laugh turns into a pitchy moan as Hongjoong sets back to work, dreamily swallowing around him, and digging the tip of his tongue into the slit, mean, until Yunho is a shaking whining mess and coming in long bursts down Hongjoong’s throat.

Yujin makes fun of both of them when they finally emerge completely debauched, but offers a high five regardless.

**\----------------**

Yunho is working his way through another huge stack of investment opportunities listed out in tantalizing bullet points when San decides to invade his office and stage a small takeover of his couch. It’s a testament to how many times this has happened that Yunho doesn’t even blink. “Hey, San. I see Jongho let you in again.”

"Jongho knows what's good for him," San huffs and flops himself against the plush armrest. “And hey yourself, where have you been lately, huh? I haven’t seen you in _ages_.”

“I’ve been busy,” Yunho yawns, bored by bullet point number fifty seven that reads like a bad fantasy novel: ‘ _A Corp wants to revitalize the urban market with sponsored graffiti on several buildings in the—_ ’ “What’s up?”

San throws a pen at Yunho’s head. “Don’t you ‘what’s up’ me. What have you been doing that you can’t answer my text messages on time?”

Yunho dodges the writing instrument before it can leave a mark on his face. He does have a board meeting to lead in two hours, appearances sometimes matter for these things. “Well, I mean Hongjoong just quit his job at the airline so we’ve been—”

“Hongjoong? Your boytoy, Hongjoong?” San whines, “You treat him better than your own best friend, what the fuck.”

Yunho finally looks up from his stack to scowl. “He’s not my boytoy, San. He’s more than that.”

“What like a boyfriend?” San snorts, folding his ankles over the other on the edge of the sofa. “That’s new.”

“Not a boyfriend, either,” Yunho finds himself dreamily staring into the middle distance while he pictures Hongjoong’s face from that morning, flushed and sweaty while Yunho had worked him open with his tongue and his fingers before he left for work. He can tell his own voice is overly fond and thick with emotion when he quietly adds, “I’m going to marry him.”

Yunho jolts when San bursts up from his position to yell, “What?!” His fists are curled into white knuckled furious balls. “He’s a golddigger! Why would you marry someone like that, you deserve _better_.”

“Don’t you dare call him that,” Yunho seethes, “You know literally nothing about him, Choi San.”

“I know you’ve been fucking around with him for less than a year,” San hisses back, face tight in anger, “Don’t be a moron!”

Yunho breathes deep, clenches the edge of his desk to keep his temper from spilling over. He knows, realistically, that his relationship moved exceptionally quick and San is only reacting this way out of concern, but fuck if it doesn’t piss him off royally when anyone talks bad about the—the _love of his life_. “San, just,” he rubs at the dull throb in his temples, “You don’t know anything about him, you don’t have the right to make those kinds of assumptions.”

San is silent for a long time, still standing in the middle of Yunho’s office against a backdrop of framed board certifications and a fake palm tree tucked into a corner. “Let me hang out with him, then.” San’s voice is back to the familiar bland deadpan of disinterest, “You mentioned he’s trying to come up with a fashion line right?” Yunho nods. “Tell him I’ll be his photog so I can get to know him better.”

Yunho’s mood lifts immediately. “You’d do that?”

“For you?” San shrugs. “Sure, why not.”

“Thank you!” Yunho stands up to hug his best friend around the neck. “I’ll let him know tonight. You’ll like him, you’ll see!”

**\----------------**

The first few articles of clothing Hongjoong bangs out are as lopsided and wonky as anything he made back when he was seventeen and just learning what a serger even _looked_ like, let alone how to work one. But, like riding a bike after so many years of inactivity, the skills are coming back in fits and starts, because he never really forgot—he’s just out of practice. Hongjoong drafts patterns and buys cheap outdated linens to repurpose and spends a lot of time on the floor covered in fabric paint drawing out words in wobbly-lined script on old denim.

He loses a lot of time staring at his collection of old technical drawings he kept in an old box hidden behind boxes from Chanel and Louis Vuitton. Some designs are alright, some remind him that there was a reason he failed out of his courses and not least of which because of his prurient interest in other people’s money. 

Hongjoong works with single minded intensity until Yunho is metaphorically knocking down his door by sending increasingly desperate texts demanding Hongjoong come home because it’s close to midnight and he’s needy. 

“Hyung, you said you would be here every night,” Yunho hicks out, legs held up and open by his own ears as Hongjoong teases the head of his dick with a tiny capsule sized vibrator, “Why do I have to beg you to come home?”

“You stay late at your office all the time working on paperwork,” Hongjoong laughs, a little cruel if he’s honest, and runs his free hand down the long length of Yunho’s leg to feel the muscles shake from the strain. “How is this any different?”

“It’s different,” Yunho tells him earnestly, tucking his knees closer to his chin and hiding the fan of his tear dotted eyelashes in the gap. “I’ve spent so long missing you when you were gone that I don’t think I can handle missing you when you’re _here_.”

Hongjoong looks and looks and looks and finds nothing but open honesty on Yunho’s suddenly shy face. Another bundle of locks, closer to the deepest buried treasure of Hongjoong’s darkest emotional core, fade to nothing _—_ no clink, no sound, no anxiety ridden palpitations to commemorate their dissolution but he feels them all the same. 

“I’ll come home,” Hongjoong tells him, chest brimming over with something that makes his chest feel overfull and aching. “At a reasonable time, I promise.”

Yunho’s answer is a shuddering inhale and undulating waves of his release over Hongjoong’s knuckles.

Yunho holds him tight to his chest as if he’s afraid Hongjoong is going to disappear again to some faraway destination he can’t follow the next morning before work, sleepy morning breath puffing against Hongjoong’s shoulder. Hongjoong allows it, wraps his own arms around Yunho’s waist now that he can be greedy without having to come up with some flimsy excuse about being cold or sleep cuddling. He feels weightless and warm and still buzzing faintly from the blowjob Yunho decided he needed to wake up with.

“San told me he wants to volunteer as your photographer when you get ready with your first designs,” Yunho murmurs into his skin under the susurration of birdsong and the sound of morning traffic. 

Jealousy, ugly and green, rears up like a lion in the roar of Hongjoong’s blood pounding in his ears. He tries not to sound like an insane person when he bites out, “Yeah?”

Yunho, bless him, doesn’t seem to notice, or if he does he doesn’t seem to care overmuch, continues with, “I’ll text you his number later, no rush.”

“Alright,” Hongjoong shoves at Yunho’s shoulders until he rolls onto his back, blinking slow, mouth still red and wet and beautiful. “Fair warning, I’m going to blow you now.”

Yunho laughs while Hongjoong shoves the elastic band of his underwear down his hips and over his knees. “Good morning to me.”

**\----------------**

It takes two more months of drafting and sewing and seam ripping and crying—both alone and at Seonghwa over the phone—before Hongjoong has a somewhat decently cohesive line of menswear mockups ready for tailoring. San texts him measurements of two models that have volunteered their time, and he spends another week making sure the shoulder seams don’t pucker.

Song Mingi and Jung Wooyoung, the two male models San recruited for the sample shoot in his Gangnam studio, are bubbly overgrown children. Hongjoong has never met anyone with so much energy as Wooyoung when San presents him with a tray of pink cherry blossom Starbucks frappes accompanying delicate pastries from a bakery across the street.

“Don’t drink those all at once, Wooyoung-ie,” San warns, “If you bounce off a wall and break a studio light I will never use you for another calendar shoot in Jeju again.”

“You worry too much,” Wooyoung responds, already half-way through a green tea and cream cheese roll cake. 

“Hongjoong-ssi! These designs are so cool,” Mingi tells him with every outward appearance of conviction. “What inspired you to come up with the wording on this top?”

The top in question is a skewed hem white button-up with words in English and French scrawled in slanting lines around the waist. “Pinterest,” Hongjoong works the last button through at Mingi’s throat, laughing when Mingi starts cackling and has to steady himself with a hand gripped tight to Hongjoong’s elbow. Their mirth is interrupted by San’s camera flash going off, directed at the side of Hongjoong’s head. 

“What was that about?” Hongjoong asks, suddenly suspicious at the odd slant of San’s mouth as he checks the image on the camera’s screen. 

“Just some background shots,” San answers, sweet; like butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth, like he’s never lied once in his life. Hongjoong knows that tone and every hackle he’s ever possessed rises at once like invisible defensive spears. “Everyone likes a good rags to riches story, the behind the scenes pictures add relatability.” San says it like it’s nothing, but the implication is clear: _I know what you’ve done, how you made it here, and I don’t appreciate you tricking my ‘friend’ one bit_.

Mingi glances between them while Wooyoung grumbles in the background about a head rush. “Are you going to turn this into a movie script?”

“I probably could,” Hongjoong scrubs a hand down his face before patting the man’s arm and directing him towards the white paper backdrop occupying one wall.

**\----------------**

Yunho is staying late at the office again thanks to another corporate take down when Eunjung rings the intercom. “Kim Hongjoong-ssi, sir, good evening,” she simpers down at the receiver, and Hongjoong is instantly on high alert. They’ve gone beyond the need for formality, and really the only time she puts it to use is when either someone she doesn’t approve of or someone the building has blacklisted tries to inch their way passed security. 

“Good evening,” Hongjoong says, wary. 

“There’s a Choi San in the lobby that would like to speak with you. Should I send him up?”

Strange. San will usually just text him if he needs anything, which he shouldn’t considering the model gig lasted for a day and the proofs are sitting in his inbox already. Just to be sure this is the right person, Hongjoong asks, “Does he have dimples and a jawline you could hurt yourself on?”

Eunjung lets out an amused sound she tries to cover up with professional throat clearing. “That’s the one.” Hongjoong hears another voice in the background whisper shout, “Tell him I’ve got food!” Eunjung’s tone is dry as the desert when she repeats, “Also he has food.”

“Ah, I know him, it’s fine then, send him up. Thank you, Eunjung-noona.” 

“Stop calling me that,” Eunjung huffs irritated affection down the line. “I’m old enough to be your mother’s mother.”

Hongjoong can’t help but giggle back, “So young!” before the chime of the elevator sounds and he has to cut off their fond bickering. 

San greets him at the door with a smile and a bag full of what smells like pork feet and three bottles of soju that remind Hongjoong of sneaking into college dorm rooms after curfew. “Hi! I thought you might be lonely so I brought you food!”

“Um, thank you,” Hongjoong watches him gracefully shuffle out of his shoes. “What makes you think I’m lonely?”

“Oh, I stopped by Yunho-puppy’s office before I came over.” San tuts, hand to his cheek in a cheap impersonation of concern. “Said he’s going to be late because C Corp is making waves about their telecom merger.”

Every word out of San’s mouth makes annoyance rise to the surface, but Hongjoong hopskips over it with a smile and sweeping invitation for San to access their kitchen. It’s pleasant enough, just the two of them making stilted small talk while neatly sidestepping the elephant in the room of San’s overwhelming disapproval of Hongjoong’s existence in Yunho’s life. Pleasantries last until, having finished the first bottle of soju and most of a container of slivered pork, San reaches down to open an obsidian carry-all to slap down pictures on the dining table surface, and says with no inflection, “Have a look at these while I’m here, Hongjoong-ssi.”

Pictures of Hongjoong laughing while Mingi leans close, almost indecent from the camera’s angle, hand holding the edge of Hongjoong’s elbow and resting against the curve of his hip. He hadn’t even noticed at the time.

"I...don't know what this is about." 

"Hongjoong-ssi, I'm going to be blunt," San scowls from across the table, his voice colder than subzero, "I don't like you, I don't trust you, and I don't think you deserve any of Yunho's kindness, but he gives it to you anyway. I've been his friend longer than you've been around and I'm telling you right now," San's face looms like a dark cloud, ominous in the fluorescent light of the kitchen. "That I would appreciate it if you would take your money-grubbing endgame and leave him alone—unless you'd like him to see these pictures out of context."

“Are you trying to blackmail me?” Hongjoong stares at the set of sample photographs, incredulous and amazed at the audacity.

“Blackmail?” San folds them back into his black case and snaps the lid closed. “I’m just making a _statement_.” He stands in one movement that makes Hongjoong a little jealous at the easy fluidity. “Enjoy the rest of your evening, Hongjoong-ssi. Tell Yunho I dropped by.”

Hongjoong can’t bring himself to say anything back, watching in mute horror as San waltzes into his oil slick shoes and out the front door with his black case held tight to his breast.

**\----------------**

Yunho is out of the country with Jongho again when Hongjoong finally comes to the realization that he hasn’t dealt with his usually inescapable panic or the imaginary looming figure of Han Jaejin breathing down his neck, and has an anxiety riddled episode so intense he can’t remember how to breathe. It feels as if his heart palpates on every third breath, like he’s drowning, like everything he’s ever loved is slowly fading to formless shadow. When it’s over—after Hongjoong had buried himself under a mound of comforters in the center of their bed with Yunho’s pillow clenched in his fists—he spends a long nerveless moment feeling wrung out and empty, and comes back online with the ring usually hung around his neck slipped down to the second knuckle of his index finger.

He stares at it, at the blue and silver encircling his skin, and breathes in.

There’s a buzzing in his ears. 

Fuck Choi San and the high horse he rode in on.

Eunjung answers the intercom on the second ring, and when Hongjoong asks for a list of nearby jewelers that specialize in making customized pieces, she mumbles out a shocked litany of “omo, omo, omo” until he’s in the lobby and she’s handing him a bullet point list of the potentials in the area and a hug to his neck. He calls in Yujin for support, and when she tearfully informs him she’s stuck in JFK for the next four hours, he calls Seonghwa and prays for death.

The first jeweler turns them away. Hongjoong thinks it more because of Seonghwa’s flagrant disregard of societal norms by wearing a mink coat in June, but Seonghwa swears it’s because the man can’t afford to source factory made diamonds on a time crunch. 

“Your coat shed all over his counter,” Hongjoong accuses, driving like a crazy man speeding down a main avenue. Seonghwa ignores him in favor of applying another round of lip balm. 

“This is fun,” Seonghwa claps his hands when Hongjoong narrowly avoids a head on collision with a delivery truck parked on the side of the road. “I’ve never seen you this desperate, I can’t wait to tell Yeosang!”

“Shut up, shut up, shut up,” Hongjoong repeats like a broken record and pulls a u-turn when they miss the exit for the second jeweler’s location.

The woman working behind the counter gives Hongjoong the distrustful side eye of someone that’s seen one too many panicked husbands coming through for last minute anniversary gifts. He hadn’t bothered to put on more than a pair of sweatpants from Adidas and one of Yunho’s old threadbare college t-shirts. “Hi, I know this is going to be, like, the weirdest request, but are you able to replicate ring designs?” He pulls out the chain and her face lights up in recognition. 

“We can,” She walks over to another case toward the back. “But luckily for you, we wouldn't have to.”

Hongjoong stops breathing. In her hands sits a cluster of blue diamonds inlaid into a thin band of platinum. It’s a mirror image of the ring around his neck and Hongjoong can’t fucking breathe. The little placard in the box boasts a ring size that would sit perfectly around Yunho’s finger. All he manages is wheezing, “Ah.”

Seonghwa neatly steps in to save him. “That’s exactly what we’re looking for, how much?”

Hongjoong hands over his wallet and the last of his savings to Seonghwa so he can finish the transaction while Hongjoong stares at a corner of the nearest display and stops thinking. “Is this your husband?” The saleswoman asks then as she rolls and gently packages the ring into a small box tied down with long strips of ribbon. 

“He wishes,” Seonghwa answers, mink coat flicked to the side so he can do a model pose for the woman’s amusement.

“Please stop,” Hongjoong hits at his hyung’s back, “Someday I’m going to stop associating with you and it’s going to be all your fault.”

The saleswoman laughs handing over Hongjoong’s purchase while Seonghwa clings to his back and makes pitiful dying cat wails into his nape.

**\----------------**

Yunho comes home a week later, by which time Hongjoong has sort of got himself under control, has slipped his ring on and off several times without shaking and rented a goddamn _gazebo_ in the _park_. He’s wasted precious time he could have spent drafting more patterns for his future clothing line, but, instead, Hongjoong has been making phone calls and setting up secret meeting points like a spy.

It’s a Sunday afternoon. The weather report says no rain and, for once, the particulate that tends to choke out Seoul’s air is thinned out to the point blue sky and sunlight shine through as if they live in the countryside and not in a major metropolitan hellscape of a city. Yunho is playing something horrible and horribly gory on the big screen when the first silent alarm chimes on his phone.

Hongjoong breathes out.

“Hey, Yunho-yah,” he says whisper soft, rubbing at Yunho’s shoulders to loosen him up, “Let’s go take a walk.”

“A walk?” Yunho doesn’t bother pausing his game, still concentrated on whatever mound of angry manflesh the monster on screen is supposed to be stumbling straight for the main character on screen. “You hate walks.”

“Yeah, but it’s a nice day and someone is posting that the ducks are back at the city pond.” He can feel sweat beading at his hairline. “You like the ducks.”

“I do like the ducks,” Yunho pauses his game and leans backward to stare at Hongjoong upside-down. “ _You_ don’t.”

“I like whatever you like.” And holy fucking shit he will marry a fucking duck if that’s what it takes to get Yunho out of the _goddamn_ penthouse. Hongjoong sucks in a shaky inhale and tries to calm his nerves. “Come on, I wanna see the sun before it disappears.”

The ring box sits like a thousand ton weight in his pocket. The ring previously on the Chanel chain around his neck is now around his left ring finger, cleverly hidden next to a Cartier stack on every digit and Hongjoong wonders if Yunho has caught on yet; wonders if he’s noticed the chain floating a little loose around his neck or the nervous fidgeting Hongjoong hides beneath his right hand.

After they park, Yujin sends him a text giving him the all clear. Seonghwa and Yeosang send simultaneous copy-cat thumbs-up emojis and, somewhere further up the path within clear view of the gazebo now covered in fairy lights, Jongho sits behind a bush with a discreet camera at the ready.

Hongjoong makes sure to stay on Yunho’s left for the walk down the pathway so the surprise of his choice of jewelry isn’t spoiled. 

“Aw, we must have just missed the ducks,” Yunho pouts, hand not laced with Hongjoong’s own pointing at the still surface of a sadly empty pond. Hongjoong swallows down the urge to confess there were no ducks to be found in the first place because the gazebo is within sight and they’re close enough he can almost make out each individual bulb brightly flickering on every strand.

Yunho gives the setup a curious look, and an equally confused one when Hongjoong tugs him to its entrance when he goes to avoid someone else’s hard work.

“Hyung?”

“Yunho,” Hongjoong starts, stops, clears his throat and tries again, “Yunho, I told you once that I wouldn’t wear your ring until I was ready to accept your proposal.”

“You did, but what does that...” Yunho trails off, zeroing in on the chain floating loose against the hollow of Hongjoong’s throat. “Hongjoong, are you—is _this_ —” Hongjoong stands statuesque as Yunho pulls the silver chain from beneath his shirt and stares unblinking at the empty space his ring used to occupy. Before Yunho can ask, he holds up his left hand to show Yunho the shape of his heart wrapped around the skin of his finger. 

Yunho starts crying. It’s the ugly kind of cry where his face screws up completely and snot bubbles out of one nostril until he wipes at it with the collar of his undershirt. Hongjoong sniffs, imagines he can hear three others in close proximity join in.

“There’s one more thing I want to give you.” Hongjoong tells him and trembles all over. Reaching into his pocket to grab the ring box is like having an out of body experience, like Hongjoong is hovering several feet off the ground and to the right. 

“You don’t have to give me anything but yourself,” Yunho sobs back, wet and ugly and perfectly imperfect. “I don’t want anything but _you_.”

“You might want this, though,” Hongjoong laughs at him, kneels on one knee with the matching ring on display, and says like a demand, “Jeong Yunho, marry me.” 

“Idiot,” Yunho bawls at him, yanking the ring from the box to his own hand and then pulling Hongjoong up to crush their mouths together even as he’s choking on angry tears. 

Once they separate, Hongjoong wipes the worst of the mess of Yunho’s face away with his thumbs. “I love you.”

“I fucking _hate_ you,” Yunho sniffs into Hongjoong’s neck, shaking like a leaf in a windstorm with his arms clasped tight around Hongjoong’s hips.

Yujin and Seonghwa come crashing through first with congratulations, followed by Yeosang’s much more subdued clapping, and Jongho makes his red faced appearance not long after. Yunho doesn't move away for the entirety of the short celebration, Hongjoong keeps one hand in the back pocket of Yunho's jeans as his own anchor in the storm that suddenly seems more like a stiff breeze than some world shattering hurricane.

Unnoticed, two ducks alight on the surface of the pond with their heads tucked together and float at the epicenter of waves crashing in miniature foam-tipped crests against the shore.

**\----------------**

In the aftermath of the whirlwind of proposals and crying jags—after they’d barely managed to make it home with Yunho’s tears blurring his vision enough they swerve at oncoming traffic numerous times—Yunho rides him slow and steady while gripping their hands together tenderly, held above Hongjoong’s shoulders and refusing to allow Hongjoong to do any of the work. It’s hot and humid in the room despite the working air conditioning, Yunho fucks down and down and the temperature continues to spike; Hongjoong thinks he’s going to crawl out of his skin if not for the stinging burn of the strain in his thighs keeping him centered and in the moment.

“Hongjoong, _jagiyah_ ,” Yunho’s breath comes out stuttering fits, still quietly crying, “We’re going to be happy,” he leans down to gentle kisses to the gape of Hongjoong’s mouth, “We’re going to make each other so fucking _happy._ ”

It doesn’t take long, for either of them, until Yunho is picking up the pace and coming untouched, curled down to sob into the center of Hongjoong’s chest while he rides out the last few twitching rolls of Hongjoong’s hips. 

They rest for minutes. Yunho dabs the worst of the cum away with more of his overpriced Burberry linens, but that turns into his fingers rubbing lube and cum around Hongjoong’s hole until Hongjoong is squirming for friction, for any kind of relief, and Yunho takes the opportunity to slick his hand with too much lube and jacks Hongjoong off too quick for him to breathe properly. He’s desperate and desperately close when Yunho stops the motion of his hand to gape Hongjoong’s hole open with the wet tip of his thumb.

“Yu-nho—,” he tries, head full of cotton and tongue thick in his mouth, “Please—please wanna come.”

“Tell me, tell me what I want to hear, hyung, and I’ll let you.”

“Yunho, I—ugh, fuck—I lo—” Hongjoong gasps around the tight gap of his teeth, “I love you, I love you so much, please—” 

“Good,” Yunho coos, wrenching Hongjoong’s orgasm from him as if by force. Before Hongjoong can recover from the oversensitivity, Yunho is already fucking into the still throbbing clench of his ass, and Hongjoong cries out. It feels nothing like the time in the car, where Yunho fucked him angry and jealous, and more like a steady unending attack on Hongjoong’s borders—like he’s trying to make camp in the deep dark center where Hongjoong can’t dig him out, too entrenched. “I love you too,” Yunho rolls his hips up slow once, just to grind mercilessly against Hongjoong’s prostate, “Someday you’re going to tell me why it took you so long to accept.”

Yunho comes while he’s buried deep, cock jerking hard within Hongjoong’s body and he sobs something that might have been words once. Yunho is light and he fills up every dark corner of Hongjoong’s anxious overwrought heart until there’s nothing left and the last locks—the last defense of Hongjoong’s once impenetrable fortress—explode into cascades of fireworks.

Hongjoong passes out.

Some nebulous amount of time later, he wakes on his side with Yunho’s cock still hard in his ass and Yunho’s fingers rubbing soothing circles against the skin of his ribs from behind. Hongjoong barely manages to slur out, “What’re you doing?”

“Holding my place,” Yunho kisses the back of his neck, tugging Hongjoong’s leg up and over his hip so he can slide in smooth angles. It hurts, it hurts but it’s so good and the sting against his rim and the drag of dick against every abused oversensitive section of his walls has Hongjoong’s own cock filling embarrassingly quick even as he cries.

Yunho fucks him slow this time with their hands—wearing the matching engagement rings clinking together—held tight against Hongjoong’s chest over the pounding of his heart. 

“I don’t think I’m going to be able to walk for a week,” Hongjoong tells him later, after Yunho had to carry him to the bathtub to soak and then carry him back out of the tub to sit on their couch. “You’ve _ruined_ me.”

“I admit I’m a little proud,” Yunho calls from the bedroom, busy breaking open a new set of sheets because their old ones are destroyed. There’s no coming back from the sheer amount of bodily fluids soaked into the cotton at this point. "Payback for all the times you fucked me and left for New York or London."

“You _would_ be,” Hongjoong grumbles. He fiddles with the new weight around his finger and smiles bashfully down at the way the ring looks wrapped around his digit. "And it's not my fault you wanted to get dicked down when I was not about to have a sore ass for a 12-hour flight the next day."

Yunho catches him in the act of admiring his hand, leaning a hip against the doorway, “I saw that.”

“You saw nothing, go away you creep.” Hongjoong groans into his palms cupped against his burning face.

“Never,” Yunho takes the opportunity to plop himself into Hongjoong’s lap and shove his own ring under Hongjoong’s nose. “You’re stuck with me now, deal with it.”

For once, the reminder of commitment doesn’t feel like a threat. Hongjoong kisses the knuckle of Yunho’s ring finger tender sweet. “Good.”

**\----------------**

Yunho takes to planning a wedding like a duck to water, Hongjoong thinks it’s more from his experience running a corporate empire like a well oiled machine than anything else but Yunho swears it's just because he's excited. He whisks Hongjoong from his attempts at sealing himself away to sew and design to taste sample cakes from twelve different bakeries and walk through seven different wedding halls.

“Aren’t you planning this a little fast?” Hongjoong pales at the pinterest board pulled up on the second screen in Yunho’s home office, the first being occupied with confusing jumbles of investor names and percentages and stock values, and the multicolored wall of sticky notes with penned numbers of potential florists. 

“No way, I’m doing this before you have a chance to pull a _you_ and back out,” Yunho gives another greenery filled moodboard the crazy eye. “By the way, Eunjung-ssi sent up a pound cake as thanks for something. What did you do?”

Hongjoong hopes it’s the strawberry filled one Eunjung waxes poetic about her son baking on parents’ day and Chuseok. “She helped me find a last minute jeweler so I sent her a bouquet of carnations.” 

Yunho stops typing to turn his head back. Hongjoong imagines he can hear the bones creaking like a rusted squeaky door and holds back the urge to giggle. “Carnations?”

“Mmm,” Hongjoong agrees, amused.

“What color?”

“Pink.”

“ _Pink_ ,” Yunho hisses and turns back to click the search bar for pink and white moodboards. Hongjoong decides to leave him to it.

**\----------------**

By the third week of July Hongjoong has a portfolio he’s somewhat proud of, and shops his designs around to several nearby studios without consulting Yunho—who more than likely would say, ‘Amazing! Let’s put them in production.’ and Hongjoong would have to suffer the same sense of failure when the line does nothing as he did walking away from his University dorm for the last time. He creates another round of pre-tailored mockups and tears up the rejection notices that pile in through his mailbox. It stings, but rejection isn’t new and Hongjoong powers through with the same determination as saw him through the tests for being allowed passage on airplanes without a ticket. The shredded remains of each letter get burned up on the tiny grill for communal use on the roof of his apartment building.

The last week, towards the end of the month, Yunho decides they need to have an engagement photoshoot and demands use of Hongjoong’s middling collection of finished garments.

Hongjoong is standing surrounded by piles of muslin fibers and half-formed paper patterns, when Yunho barges in to ask. “But why?” 

“Because I want to show you off,” Yunho pouts, draped against Hongjoong’s back like a limpet, “I want everyone to see my beautiful future husband in his fancy clothes and go ‘wow I wish I could wear that’ and then I can give them your business card.”

“I don’t even _have_ a business card,” Hongjoong says faintly. His pulse still stutters and rises when Yunho mentions his excitement over their nuptials. Yunho has even taken to singsonging the word ‘husband’ over and over again like parrot while he makes breakfast in the morning—still consisting of mostly inedible burnt toast and sad, runny eggs. 

“You will,” Yunho smacks a kiss to his cheek. “San’s volunteered his time again, say yes.”

Choi San. Hongjoong chews at his bottom lip. The guy who tried—may still be trying—to get Hongjoong to leave Yunho alone and disappear back into the lonely sea of desperate sugar babies. To say Hongjoong doesn’t like him would be an understatement, but if spending two hours watching him make Yunho laugh in front of a camera is what it takes to make him happy, Hongjoong will put up with it. San glares at him when Yunho isn’t looking, scowls like a bad version of a cartoon villain, but keeps his mouth firmly shut when he’s not calling out directions and lighting changes.

“You look nervous,” Yunho whispers like a secret into Hongjoong’s ear while they wait for the next backdrop to be set up, gently cupping a hand at his elbow.

“I’m never nervous,” Hongjoong lies, crisp heart patterned button down gaped open almost to his navel to keep his core temperature down in the muggy heat of the studio lights. “You’re just projecting.”

“Nah,” Yunho grins and smushes a kiss to the middle of his forehead. “Your cheeks are all pale and you’ve got sweat on your lip.” Yunho laughs when Hongjoong scrubs at his mouth, moritfied. “See? Nervous.”

“I—” Hongjoong gapes, Yunho laughs harder until he’s almost bent double trying to hold back his mirth. “How are you not? We’re engaged!”

“I’m too happy to be nervous, hyung-ah.” Yunho giggles, circling his arms around Hongjoong’s waist to spin them around in the middle of bustling behind the scenes. “You’re so cute.”

“No,” Hongjoong denies lightning quick. “You’re just dumb.” He picks at the edge of the sweater vest Yunho chose to put on. “And don’t call me cute.”

Yunho only snorts and presses another sloppy kiss to the edge of Hongjoong’s mouth just to be contrary. “Come on, San is probably about to get pissy if we don’t take our places soon.”

“Mmm,” Hongjoong wilts against him, fingers suddenly nerveless at the sound of San’s name in Yunho’s mouth. It’s a joyless kind of victory to be here flaunting his disregard for San’s warning sirens since Yunho is still unaware and _still_ laughing that high pitched squeaky laugh at all of San’s terrible jokes.

The next set of photos is staged against a backdrop of white with Hongjoong sitting on the ground with his legs spread, leaned back to rest on his palms while Yunho hovers over him, back to the camera, with a smirk and quickly darkening bedroom eyes. Hongjoong shifts one shoulder to flash the edge of one pierced nipple to watch Yunho track the movement with flared nostrils—his dick visibly twitches beneath the shiny leather pants.   
  
San slices through the charged atmosphere with, “I am contractually obligated to inform you that if you two decide to fuck in my studio, there are cameras rolling and I _will_ sell the sextape on the black market.”

**\----------------**

Hongjoong gets his first letter of interest and an offer of design space from a company he adores on the fifth of September, two months away from his wedding, and screams loud enough the stay at home mom from three doors away knocks to make sure he’s alright.

**\----------------**

Since spearheading the merger between two major telecommunications companies, Yunho has had to deal with a new influx of obnoxious old men to his already full-to-bursting board of directors populated by even older men and three extremely bigoted old women. They accept his announcement of taking an extended vacation for his upcoming wedding and honeymoon as if he’s announced retirement and leaving the company to be run by gorillas from the zoo.

Several things happen at once: Yunho stops talking, Youngchul and Jaegyu from his Gangnam branch both start speaking over each other, and pandemonium breaks. Yunho instantly dreams of being home watching Hongjoong flick through Vogue and window shop online for fabric he can’t pronounce.

“What about the delegation from Thailand? They’re already talking of combining with A Corp on the urban market if we don’t make an offer.”

Yunho goes to his happy place. Hongjoong; the overstuffed chair in front of his big screen; Hongjoong wearing those clear grandpa glasses when he thinks no one is looking; his bathtub full of strawberry scented bubbles; Hongjoong in the black skirt—

“And my daughter’s perfume line goes into production the first week you’re gone, what about her launch?”

“Youngchul-ssi, I assure you that everything is taken care of and there are contingency plans in place should something fall through. The Thailand deal won’t go to A Corp, their offer is too low and they can barely come up with innovative enough ideas to expand their merchandising deals beyond Korea without tripping over their own feet.” Yunho keeps his arms held behind his back to hide the angry pinch to his wrist so he stays in control and clear headed. “I am informing you all of this _now_ as a courtesy so that any matters that need my _direct_ attention are forwarded before I take my leave of absence.” Half the members frown, grumbling into the ears of their underpaid and undervalued aides. Yunho stares at a mark he’d made on the opposite wall years ago to keep his gaze focused and uninterested. “That is all, meeting adjourned.”

Jongho stands like a barrier in front of his office door when he finally makes his way back, head in a fog and mood dark. “Heads up, your fiancé is in there waiting for you.” 

“Hongjoong? Why?”

“Didn’t say, but he looked happy.” Jongho shrugs one shoulder. “By the way, if you two decide to be nasty can you please knock or something so I can put in earplugs? I don’t want to hear you getting off ever again if I can help it.”

Yunho colors, face hot and going hotter down to his neck. “That happened _one time_ and it was all San’s doing anyway.”

“Once was enough,” Jongho hisses back, hand on the knob to let Yunho through to his work space, “Stop giving me details.”

True enough, Yunho is greeted by Hongjoong, smiling wide and flushed and beautiful, in the middle of the room clutching a crumpled piece of paper to his chest. “Prada wants to take me on as a creative director.”

Yunho has some sort of horrifying mental lapse and comes to with Hongjoong bent over the edge of his desk, hand in the still dyed red strands of his future husband’s hair, fucking in tight thrusts to hear the edge of his breath punch out of his mouth. “Why didn’t you tell me,” Yunho growls, “that you were looking for a job?”

“I wasn’t—not a _job_ —it’s a first step to—fucking _goddamn_ —” Hongjoong breaks off to cry into his palms, fragments of words tumbling into the gaps of his fingers and Yunho jerks him upward to get him to stop. 

“I want to hear you,” Yunho bites at his ear while Hongjoong gasps loud and breathy and open as Yunho rocks into him. 

“Jongho is _right outside_ ,” Hongjoong warns. 

Yunho scrapes nails down his chest to feel the drag of his peaked nipples and the metal through them. “I don’t care.”

Jongho accepts the keys to Yunho’s car and his request for a pair of sweatpants from the largest chest of drawers at his penthouse with a scowl and a seething, “I hate you.”

**\----------------**

One month and six days before the wedding, Hongjoong comes home to laughter. Yunho has San over and the pair are giggling at something playing on Yunho’s phone. Hongjoong tries to ignore the vine of jealousy winding around his spine, has been trying to convince himself not to hate San because he’s Yunho’s best friend for a reason, but the roots run deep and mostly he just feels small and angry every time they’re in the same room.

Yunho’s head pops up with the closing of the door, and yells too loud and too enthusiastic, “Baby! Babe, Hongjoong,” Yunho makes grabby hands in his direction, “Love of my life, come look at this thing, it’s really funny!”

San makes gagging noises, Hongjoong ignores him in favor of laughing. “Oh wow, you are really drunk, huh?” 

“No,” Yunho cries at him, vowel stretching in a long drawn out moan, still trying his best to make the forward momentum of his grasping fingers magically make Hongjoong appear within their reach.

“Yes,” Hongjoong takes pity on him by at least walking close enough to hold one wriggling hand and smooths his fingers through the wild tangle of Yunho’s hair. “Drink some water for me.”

Yunho stares up at him glassy-eyed, blinking out of sync, as if Hongjoong holds the answer to all of the world’s secrets. “I’d do anything if it’s for you.”

“Oh my _god_ ,” San makes the sign of the cross with his own fingers, clearly not as inebriated. Yunho has slid forward enough that he’s hiding cooing noises into Hongjoong’s navel. “This is disgusting. You two are _disgusting_.”

“Don’t worry, I know,” Hongjoong cringes. Yunho continues the slow ooze into Hongjoong’s personal space until he’s half-off the couch and mumbling about peonies. “Yunho, please stop embarrassing me and drink some water.”

Yunho’s only response is a childish, “I’ll drink _you_ ,” followed by a yawn and a low, wheezing snore.

Hongjoong unfortunately has to enlist San’s help to get Yunho detangled from his waist and into the bedroom. Hongjoong places a kiss to each of Yunho’s eyelids—because he can, because he’s allowed to—and does his best to ignore the prickling sensation of San’s glare stabbing directly into his back as he runs gentle fingers against the color high in Yunho’s cheeks. 

“Hongjoong-ssi,” San whispers to him. “Can I speak to you a moment before I go?”

Hongjoong, against his better judgement, nods his head in agreement. The door to their bedroom is barely fully closed when San says, without any real inflection but still scathing in its bitterness, “Don’t take this the wrong way — or do, I don’t care — but I don’t approve of this, Hongjoong-ssi.” San’s arms are pulled tight to his chest in a defensive position. “I think we both know why.”

He was expecting this but listening to San speak makes his teeth hurt. “I don’t blame you, but—”

“Break off the engagement.”

Hongjoong inhales sharply. “Excuse me?”

“You heard me,” San busies himself with pulling on his shoes in the entryway. “You’re no good for him and we both know it. I’ve told you before, Yunho is a good man, a _great_ man, and all you’re going to do is bring him down and steal a quarter of his wealth before finding your next target.”

“I would never—”

“Dude, save it,” San laughs, mean and cold, “I know your type, alright? It’ll be fun for six months or a year before you get tired of him and go off in search of your next cashcow.” San walks up to grab a fistful of Hongjoong’s shirt, his collar pulls tight against his throat. “Break the engagement or I’ll do it for you.”

Hongjoong sneers. “And how would you do that? Those pictures?”

“We have _history_ ,” San smirks, “and I have connections. You’re his first _real_ relationship since he climbed the corporate ladder, it’ll be easy to spread doubt about your intentions, especially now that you've managed to land designer position at Prada after, what, two maybe three months of work? Bullshit.”

“Why do you hate me so much?”

“Because I loved Yunho myself, once,” San declares. “I’ve seen him hurt and I don’t want to see it again. Game recognizes game, Hongjoong-ssi,” the elevator chimes it’s arrival. “Remember that.”

Before Hongjoong can even begin to unpack all of the newly revealed information, San is waving sarcastic spirit fingers goodbye and sauntering his way into the elevator. Blood pounds in his ears from a mixture of shame and anger—everything feeling as if it’s crashing in around Hongjoong’s ears. Maybe San is right.

Maybe all of this is a huge mistake and all Hongjoong is going to do is fall back into old habits fucking men out of their money, only this time it’s Yunho and instead of rent money it’s funds for Hongjoong’s clothing empire.

The imaginary spectre of Han Jaejin—his goonies; the refusal to acknowledge Hongjoong’s existence; the horrible tightness in Hongjoong’s chest that comes with him—cackles long and loud in the silence of the room. Hongjoong sits on the couch feeling weightless and numb, stares at the ring on his finger and makes a lightning quick decision not to be selfish anymore. Because Yunho deserves someone that’s stable; someone that didn’t spend a quarter of their life hyper focused on money and dick; someone that makes him happy and laugh high pitched and squeaky without having to try. It feels as if Hongjoong is skating on the vulnerable, razor thin edge of something huge and he's taken a fall on the wrong side.

The shape of Yunho’s heart is circular and silver, with blue diamonds in a bundle at the center, and Hongjoong is going to give it back.

Yunho stirs a little when Hongjoong falls in to bed something like two in the morning once he’s finally managed to calm down. “San leave?”

“He’s gone,” Hongjoong kisses the top of Yunho’s head as his world wraps himself around Hongjoong’s middle. Yunho slurs something against Hongjoong’s collarbones and he can’t stop himself from laughing, wet and throaty from his crying jag. “Go back to sleep, Yunho.”

“‘Kay,” Yunho yawns against Hongjoong’s shirt. He manages a semi-coherent, “Love you,” before Yunho is out like a light snoring once more.

“Yeah,” Hongjoong sniffs against the well of emotion surging in his chest— horrible and aching. “I know.”

**\----------------**

Yunho wakes up alone.

It’s a not unusual occurrence with Hongjoong’s sleep schedule fucked over from years of catching red-eye flights, it’s just strange considering the day of the week. The hangover from too much tequila pounds behind his eyeballs and makes the room spin, but not enough for Yunho to miss the pile sitting innocent on his nightstand.

Yunho stares down at the little slip of paper being held down by a ring—the one he’d bought however many moons ago in a different country while Minnie Mouse made cooing noises at him over a jewelry counter. 

_‘I love you. I’m no good for you. Please be happy.’_

Yunho spends the first two minutes in post-drunk stupor and the next seventeen getting more and more pissed off. The first twelve calls get him nowhere, no doubt Hongjoong’s phone is turned off or muted, so he calls the next best option: San. His best friend that showed up with two bottles of liquor last night, who still dislikes his fiancé, who is there when suddenly Hongjoong isn’t.

San yawns at him over FaceTime, creases from his pillow making lines across his cheek and his nose. “What? What’s happening, why are you calling me so early?”

Yunho swallows against the hard rock of anger sitting in his throat. “San, did Hongjoong say anything to you last night?” 

“About what?” San crinkles his nose. 

“About this,” Yunho holds up his ring—the one for Hongjoong—close enough to the camera so it can’t be mistaken for anything else. 

San squints one-eyed at his own screen before clapping a hand against his mattress, a low thump over their connection. “Oh, so he actually went through with it, good.” 

“Excuse me?”

“Yunho, puppy, we both know he was only in it for the money. This is a prime opportunity for you to find someone real,” San pouts at him while a muscle starts spasming in Yunho’s cheek from how hard he’s clenching his jaw shut. “You deserve that much.”

“I can’t believe,” Yunho stops, growls down at the receiver, “Did you put him up to this?”

San gives him a bored look in return. “Yes. Because I know his type and I know what’s best for you, asshole. You’ll thank me later.”

“I’ll thank you to keep your nose out of my personal business,” Yunho hisses back, anger only held back by their shared history of college exams and that one time they’d experimented in his office after six shots of vodka. “What is wrong with you?”

“Nothing is wrong with me, but there’s something wrong with _you_ for wanting to marry a fucking sugar baby!” San yells back. “How stupid can you be? He’ll bleed your wallet and leave you hanging up to dry!”  
  
“We went to fucking Disney together you moron!”  
  
San’s face is a wide open wound of shock and only manages to get out a small breath before Yunho is grumbling, “Goodbye” and hanging up in his face. 

  


**\----------------**

Hongjoong spends a lot of time staring at the ceiling and wondering how it is that he’s come to be this much of a monumental fuckup. 

His apartment is devoid of most furniture save his couch and a drafting table. There are three different mannequins with various sections of fabric pinned to the curves. He doesn’t even own a bed anymore having given it away to a charity after he moved in totally with Yunho. Hongjoong has a pitiful, hysterical moment where he wonders how he’s going to afford to eat when his creator position doesn’t start until after his would-be wedding. 

Hongjoong expects the knock on his door; expects Yunho standing furious and furiously sad at the entrance so he can throw his ring back in his face. Hongjoong expects to get yelled at, to be told to return everything he’s ever been given or given away, but instead Yunho opens his mouth to say, “San is a fucking moron and anyone who listens to him is no better.” 

Yunho takes an aggressive step forward that makes him flinch, and cups each cheek tenderly in both palms—huge, wonderful, too forgiving hands. “Hyung. Hongjoong. San doesn’t speak for me, nor should he. I can’t believe you would try this shit without even bothering to talk to me first.”  
  
“I—but San—” Hongjoong glares when Yunho scowls further and mushes his cheeks together to muffle his words.

Yunho glares back. “If you even think of implying _San_ knows me better than you do, I will find those blazers you love so much and set them on fire.”

Hongjoong slaps at the hands on his face, ignoring the threat to his Balmain children because they’re tucked away safely in a corner Yunho probably couldn’t access. “He does know you better! We’ve been together for barely more than a _year,”_ Hongjoong mortifyingly feels his lips tremble in shame, “And most of that year was me being a secret partner none of your friends even knew. What was I supposed to think?”

“You were supposed to think that I love you and could care less what anyone else assumes,” Yunho gathers him up in his warm embrace against the starched surface of his linen button-down, “Hyung, I don’t know why you think you don’t deserve to have nice things but it’s got to stop.”

Hongjoong quivers on shaking knees, rests all of his weight against Yunho’s chest and hopes he doesn’t let go. “You’re the nicest thing I’ve ever had and I don’t deserve you at all.”

“Maybe not,” Yunho arms tighten around his shoulders when Hongjoong finally gives in and laughs, half sob and half self deprecating amusement. “I still want to marry you though.” He punctuates the statement by bringing out the ring Hongjoong left on Yunho’s nightstand and holding it up with two fingers between them. A peace offering. 

Hongjoong remembers that last night spent sharing a room with Yujin, when things felt less dire and the newness of the proposal still made him feel like floating. “Even though I’m a wuss?”

“Even then,” Yunho’s voice is a warm blanket Hongjoong wants to curl into and never leave. “If you’d let me.”

He does.

**Author's Note:**

> for those that leave comments:  
> i see you, i appreciate you, i don't respond 99% of the time because i have all the social grace of a soggy french fry  
> thank you, thank you, thank you, _thank you_
> 
> \- Ash <3


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